


Un fil de soie, une chaîne de fer

by Fontainebleau



Category: The Magnificent Seven (2016)
Genre: Established Relationship, M/M, Period-Typical Homophobia, Period-Typical Racism
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-08
Updated: 2017-12-24
Packaged: 2018-08-29 21:02:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 23,729
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8505259
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Fontainebleau/pseuds/Fontainebleau
Summary: To understand the present you have to understand the past.





	1. Chapter 1

Billy’s sitting on the bare boards of the corridor in the dark. It’s long gone midnight and the hotel is quiet. The commotion had come from them, first shouting, then struggling, and finally Goody snarling cold-eyed at him, ‘Go,’ the door slamming and the lock clicking. The owner came halfway up the stairs in her shawl and nightgown to protest, but Billy just shook his head at her, and seeing him alone and silent she shrugged and retreated. He leans his head back against the wall, the sound of stifled sobs carrying faintly through. This is a bad one, for sure, the worst he’s seen, but he understands how it works; the storm will blow over soon enough. This time, though, he’s having to confront an ugly truth of his own. He tries to swallow it down, but it keeps rising in his chest. Billy sits and listens and tries not to think, and eventually falls into a fitful sleep.

A hand on his shoulder snaps him awake, and he momentarily reels at finding himself on the wooden floor, propped awkwardly against the wall. Goody is shaking his shoulder; he’s drawn and pale, eyes still swollen. The flat grey light shows that it’s just dawn. ‘Billy. I’m sorry. Please come back.’ For a moment Billy just stares at him, then he attempts to get to his feet. He’s so stiff that he can’t stand, and Goody has to catch him as he stumbles, taking his weight. His back and legs are cramping, and he leans on him as they limp back inside. He takes only long enough to pull his boots off before he rolls himself onto the tangled bed. Goody comes to the other side and lies down, holding himself tensely on the edge of the mattress. His pain is so evident that Billy simply whispers, ‘Here. Come here,’ and gathers him into his arms. Goody curls against his chest, face pressed into his neck. Billy holds him as tight as he can, resting his chin on his head. ‘Ssh,’ he breathes, then crashes straight down into a black well of sleep.

When he wakes again, there’s sunlight coming through the thin curtain, and the noise of life in full swing outside – the rumble of carts, shouting, the thump of unloading. Goody’s still asleep, and what he most wants is just to lie there, putting off what has to come. But he’s still dressed, his bladder’s bursting and he’s dry with thirst, so he gets up, making Goody stir. He comes back with fresh water in the jug and a glass, and after drinking himself he takes it to the side of the bed. He can tell by the subtle change in his posture that Goody’s awake, but clinging to the last vestiges of sleep rather than face the morning. Billy squats down by the bed, speaking to his back, ‘Water. You should drink.’ 

Goody rolls over. His expression is stricken, but he takes the glass and drinks. When he’s done, Billy takes it back from him and sets it on the floor, then climbs onto the bed to sit against the headboard. He draws Goody over to lie with his head in his lap, stroking gently down his back. Goody says quietly, ‘There aren’t enough words for me to say how sorry I am.’ 

Billy is silent for a long time. Part of him wants to offer easy reassurance; it’s on his tongue to promise, _It doesn’t matter; I’ll never leave you_ , but he knows he owes Goody the truth. The words come slowly. 

‘When you threw me out…’ Goody makes a small sound of unhappiness and Billy rubs his back to take the sting from it. ‘…that’s not it. I know how it takes hold of you, makes you say… You won’t drive me away. But last night…’ He doesn’t want to say it. ‘I saw myself, lying outside your door like your dog. Just waiting to be let back in.’ He can’t look at Goody’s face. ‘I swore I’d never – Goody, you had my warrant, and you weren’t the first. You don’t know what it cost…’ He can’t get it to come out clearly. 

Goody rolls over onto his back, and seeing the lines etched on his face Billy hates himself for not making this easier. ‘You see me at my worst. It splits me open and shows you what’s inside, and I wish it were different, but it isn’t. If I started trying to tell you how ashamed I am, I’d never stop.’ 

‘I’m not saying it’s your fault. I know ... but this, it makes me … I can’t be your servant.’

Goody turns to grasp his arm. ‘You can’t think I meant ... you’re never that. We’re partners. Equals. God knows, you’re ten times the man I am.’

‘That’s easier to say when you’ve always been the master.’ There it is, out in the light at last, a point so sore that they’ve always stepped carefully around it. ‘You’ve never had to fight for a place in the world.’

He can see that Goody doesn’t want to hear this. ‘Goddammit, Billy, maybe you haven’t noticed me regretting my past, all of it, every moment of every day? I know I ask too much of you, but I would never try to make you feel less than you are.’

 _Easy to say_. ‘And yet there I was out in the corridor for everyone to see. Until you were willing to call me back in.’

‘For Christ’s sake, Billy, I don’t want to make you my servant. I’ll go on apologising for as long as you want. I’ve tried to strangle you before now, when I’ve not known what I was doing, tried to shoot you: if you can forgive that, why not this?’

It seems impossible to say what he means. ‘I came here without my freedom. You have no idea what I’ve done to be where I am. And now you, this, is making me into something else.’

Goody sits up. ‘You’re torturing both of us. What do you want me to say to you? Go if you have to? You know I can’t do without you. Don’t go? I can’t make you stay if it’s not something you can bear.’ The argument’s run into the ground. 

After a while Goody speaks again, a line of verse: ‘ _L’amour, si doux comme c’est amer: un fil de soie, une chaîne de fer_. Means-' 

The clarity of anger comes as a relief, and Billy lets it wash through him. ‘Don’t patronise me. You think telling me poetical shit in a language you know I don’t understand is going to help?’

‘No,’ says Goody, ‘I don’t think anything is going to help. If you’re looking to me for help you’ll be disappointed. Billy, if you can’t live with me like this, I’ll understand, but I can’t carry a load of shame for you too.’

‘So I fix this myself, or I don’t fix it? Fuck you.’ Billy’s on his feet, grabbing for his boots, and this time the hand slamming the door behind him is his own.

\--

Goodnight lies in the tangle of sweaty sheets, weight on his chest like a stone. It’s true: he doesn’t know where to begin or end blaming himself. In his rage and despair he’d turned on Billy, and a confused memory of some of the things he shouted last night surfaces to make him flinch. Well, pride has been a luxury beyond his own reach many years since, the weakness in him so great that hiding it is impossible. But now Billy’s strangling in his own feelings, and he’s the cause. _I’d lie down at his door. Hell, I’d kneel at his feet_. But Billy’s right, he’s never known servitude. He’s said exactly the wrong thing, made a bad situation worse, then worse again. If it’s got Billy talking about his past, then it’s serious: he knows next to nothing about the road that brought him to that bar in Texas. He read the bare details of the warrant when he took the job on – killing two men to break his indenture – but he’s never pressed to find out more: it never seemed like his business, and Billy certainly never indicated that it might be. Though the uncomfortable thought has occurred to him, more than once, that if events had gone a different way that day, he might have ended as just one more in Billy Rocks’ considerable trail of corpses.

In the end hunger drives him out to face the world. He knows that Billy won’t be welcoming the looks of any guests who might have heard the disturbance or possibly seen its aftermath, so he seeks him out in the anonymity of the daytime saloon; sure enough, there he is in the second one he tries. It’s not busy, but drinking’s always someone’s business; a couple of card games are going on, and the girls huddle together at the back of the room, largely ignored. Billy’s on his own, and as usual, he’s attracting attention. Goodnight himself could sit alone and unnoticed in any bar from here to Baton Rouge, but Billy, quite apart from being Asian and strikingly good-looking, doesn’t exactly work to blend in. Of course he could cut his hair short to his skull, could sheathe his knives in leather, keep his gloves in his pocket, but then he wouldn’t look so … remarkable. 

Goodnight still vividly recalls the effect Billy had on him the first time he laid eyes on him. He understands that it’s partly a way to protect himself – he’d be out of place, stared at, however he dressed, so why not give them something to look at? – but he’s also something of a peacock, not above courting admiration. Today, even without his belt of fancy knives, his long pinned-up hair and fighter’s gloves draw open stares all round, which he’s currently meeting with a challenging scowl.

Goodnight fetches a bottle from the bar and orders what there is to eat, then carries bottle and glass back to the table and asks meekly, ‘May I join you?’ Billy pushes out a chair with his foot. The barkeep jerks his head towards one of the girls, and she comes to lean over the back of his chair. ‘Hi. I’m Lizzie; would you like to buy a girl a drink?’ She’s pretty enough and half-dressed, but he’s hardly in the market for her charms; he pats her hand and tells her, ‘Maybe later, sweetheart. We’d make poor company for you right now.’ Indifferent, she hitches a shoulder and turns her attention to the cardplayers behind them. 

Billy’s concentrating on his plate, tearing into his food as usual. When he finally pushes it away and drains his glass, Goodnight reaches for the bottle to refill it. Billy draws his cigarette case out of his vest, takes out a cigarette and lights it. When Goodnight realises he’s not going to share, it’s like the flick of a lash; he wonders if anything’s going to set this right. He takes out one of his own, and asks, ‘Light?’ To his surprise, Billy curls his gloved fingers around his hand to steady it as he dips his head and touches the lit end of his cigarette to Goodnight’s. His face is impossible to read, but Goodnight murmurs an experimental ‘ _Chéri_ ,’ in return. As he smokes, he feels Billy’s arm along the back of the chair pressing against his back, then a warm hand drifts under his collar to stroke his skin. _So this is the way it’s going to play_ , he thinks. He’s desperately tired. 

The poker players’ chatter behind them dies, then there’s an explosion of over-loud laughter. ‘…wonder Lizzie weren’t to their taste.’ The way the comment’s directed it can’t be anything but a challenge, but Billy evidently doesn’t feel inclined to react, or to move his hand. Sure enough, a chair clatters out and he hears more snorts as the same voice says from closer behind them, ‘Go on, mister, why don’t you just put him on your knee and kiss him?’ 

Goodnight turns to see who this loudmouth is. He’s a hefty man, shirt one size too small to emphasise his bulk, and obviously enjoying the chance to intimidate; his leer suggests that this particular opportunity has an added piquancy for him. The saloon’s gone quiet. Goodnight looks at Billy’s expressionless face. Plainly the situation’s already beyond redemption, but for form’s sake he tries. ‘I don’t know what the problem is here, my friend, but there’s no cause to involve yourself in our affairs.’ 

As expected, it fails. ‘Well I think there is cause for in-vol-ving myself when I see a pair of cocksuckers sitting as brazen as day right in front of me.’ 

Billy stands up in one fluid motion. Compared to his opponent he’s slight, and one of the other players jeers, ‘Now, Steve, you know it ain’t fair to be hitting girls.’ 

‘You get one chance to apologise,’ Billy says, but Steve laughs in his face. ‘I ain’t apologising to you, you Celestial cocksucker. Is that what you do for him: run his errands, wash his clothes and suck his dick?’ _Merciful God_ , thinks Goodnight.

Billy hisses, and too quick to see, Steve’s head snaps back. He touches a hand to a split lip, then reaches to grab Billy’s vest, but the click of the barkeep’s shotgun stops him. Gun levelled between them, he orders curtly, ‘Outside. I’ve no quarrel with either of you, but you don’t brawl in here.’ 

‘You going to come out and take your kicking, boy?’ sneers Steve. 

Billy fixes him with a passionless stare. ‘I can teach you to show some respect.’ 

‘Teach?’ Steve shoulders past Billy, followed by his friends and most of the saloon’s patrons. ‘Ain’t your place to teach me anything.’ 

Goodnight pulls his chair back to the table and sighs. Billy’s unlikely to need his help, and even less likely to accept it right now. He’s obviously trying to punish somebody, though it’s not entirely clear to him who; he feels an unlikely twinge of pity for Steve. 

\--

A fight never fails to draw a crowd of interested spectators, and they’ve resolved themselves into a loose circle with Billy and Steve at the centre. ‘Fair fight,’ announces a self-appointed marshal, but that’s the last thing that’s going to happen. Steve is flexing, pacing, spitting insults, working himself up, but Billy holds himself still. This is his arena, his dancing-floor: it brings him to a clear space, setting his divided halves back together and uniting them into a seamless whole. He’s fought all types: sly ones, fingers hooking for soft targets, enraged flailing drunks, cool disciplined ones; he knows exactly what to expect here.

Sure enough, Steve comes charging at him straight off, trying to use his weight to take him down and pin him, but Billy stands off, catching his impetus, spinning and sending him sprawling. A better opponent would learn, but this one, Billy guesses, has never learnt finesse, weight, strength and ferocity usually enough of an advantage. He curses and comes barrelling back in with a roar, and Billy catches him with knee and foot to send him down again. He could finish this quickly, but what would be the point? This is going to be an exhibition. Billy makes himself the fulcrum, flickering from stillness to motion, and methodically, blow by blow, crack of shoulder by twist of leg by crunch of cartilage, he beats Steve into submission. 

By the time Steve rolls headlong in the mud and doesn’t get up again, Billy is panting for breath. He takes a moment, hands on knees, then straightens up to stares down the crowd. No one else seems keen to stand up for the public morality of the town, so he turns his back on the slumped figure and walks deliberately back up to the saloon. Goodnight’s still sitting at the table. Billy thumps down next to him, all over dirt, knuckles bloodied and one eye already swelling. ‘Enjoy the show?’ he asks sourly.

Goodnight raises an eyebrow. ‘Was it for my benefit? I didn’t realise.’ He signals to Lizzie: ‘A cloth and some water, if you’d be so obliging.’ She brings a bowl, clearly willing to attend to Billy herself, but Goodnight takes it from her with his most charming smile. He must reckon they’re far enough in credit here for him to be able to clean the blood from his partner’s face in public.

\--

It’s not usual to set out so late in the afternoon, but with the town gone this bad on them it’s nothing but a relief. Once the storefronts disappear below the horizon it’s just the two of them in an emptiness of sky and brush, under the fading sun. The tension drains from Goodnight almost instantly; for all he values what civilisation has to offer – a soft bed, hot water, good food – the unrelenting scrutiny of his fellow men always has him fleeing back to the open plains before too long. There’s no sound beyond the creak and jingle of saddle and bridle, and the occasional skittering jackrabbit. Billy’s a silent companion at the best of times, but now as they ride Goodnight can all but see the air waver from the simmer of his thoughts. For once he’s not tempted to chatter to fill the silence, though the verse runs through his mind. _Fil de soie, chaîne de fer_. He wouldn’t recommend his condition to anyone, but perhaps it is simpler when you wear your chest wide open, beating heart on display for all to see. _At least he’s still here, for now. Can’t let him go, can’t make staying easy for him_. 

It’s a bare couple of hours before they have to camp, and the light is almost gone when they find a likely spot, where a dry wash comes down between rocky walls. Billy winces as he gets off his horse, the effects of the fight caught up with him, but Goodnight’s offer of help dies in his throat at his expression. The rhythm of horses, wood, fire, cooking, is at least familiar, talk unnecessary. By the time they’re eating it’s already dark. Afterwards, Goodnight sets himself up with his flask and a smoke, stretches his legs by the fire and waits. Billy’s settled himself up against the canyon wall a little distance away, tossing pebbles at some unseen target. He doesn’t know where Billy is with this, doesn’t know whether to expect accusation or self-reproach, but he’s not expecting the question that comes out of the darkness: 

'How much do you know about the railroad?’ 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Spike: 'I may be love's bitch, but at least I'm man enough to admit it.' Another attempt on the fascinating enigma that is Billy Rocks.
> 
> Big disclaimer: no offence to B-HL or anyone else, but I just can't find a historically satisfactory way to make Billy Korean. If he was an indentured labourer on the Northern Pacific railroad, to make him anything other than Chinese seems to me to require such a convoluted back story that he'd lose any significant cultural background anyway.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> ‘Billy was an indentured servant, and [he] couldn’t be patient, so [he] killed two of [his] masters and ran away.’ 
> 
> ‘a warrant issued by the Northern Pacific Railroad Company.’

The floodgate opens and memory comes rushing in, the things he wants least to remember boiling up to the surface all at once: Yiu, strongman Yiu, hauling impossible loads of stone, balancing wooden ties on his shoulder, laughing as he arm-wrestles the biggest Irishman. The boy, burning with fever in the tent as Li Chin collects his bet outside. Cheng’s hands on his, eyes rolling back into his head. The rumble and crash of tons of stone, sudden and loud as the end of the world, the billowing dust. And always, at the heart of it, the shining rails, the future laid in iron. 

When you see it from the outside, building the railroad is beautiful. It’s an exquisite machine with thousands of moving parts, men, animals, stone, wood and metal flowing effortlessly from one point to the next: first the graders, team by team, cutting, clearing, levelling the ground, empty wagons moving up to collect the earth and full ones circling away; carts of gravel for the roadbed arriving in an unending chain; further back, the wooden sleepers laid down at precisely the right place and moment for the tie-men to spike them down, hammers swinging in harmony; then the rails themselves coming up, lifted gleaming into place, spiked and tied. Piece by piece, link by link, the track extends, spooling out behind the inching railhead, and the construction camp works like the interior of a watch, measured, precise and perfect.

When he first arrived, among a score of workers fresh off the ship, they stood above the railhead and saw the work of building in its ticking perfection, but from the moment that they followed their contractor down the hillside, the world around them narrowed to a tiny compass. From the inside, the construction camp was too chaotic to comprehend, all around tents, shanties, heaps of stone and spoil, sheds, mules, wagons and men, hundreds upon hundreds of men, Chinese men, hauling, carting, carrying, shovelling, hammering, a hurricane of motion and noise. 

When he began, he was someone else. He’d bought his passage here with years of his life, and those years were going to be eaten by the railroad.

He remembers the helpless panic of the first day. The shift was long and the work hard, but that’s the nature of work; what was new was his complete inadequacy in the face of what was required. On his first day he hauled water, shovelled stone and gravel, simple tasks, but the pace was impossible; he was always late, always standing in someone’s way. He was a piece of grit in the mechanism, a stutter in the timing, but this was going to be his life: he had to learn.

He remembers the last day, muscles grown hard from long use, his status unquestioned, the rails his element. He glided effortlessly through the ticking machine, an efficient working part, hissing ‘Faster,’ at some hapless panicking recruit, and all through the long shift he carried the weight of betrayal, hauling it with the stone; beneath his ribs he felt the crush of the creature about to hatch.

\---

At the beginning he took what was given. They were split, the new arrivals, Cheng checking his list and shoving them off to different gangs, leaving him standing alone and bemused among empty tents, until Kwan the cook took pity on him and gave him tea, showed him his cot, where to stow his few belongings. Kwan had said to him then, crinkling his eyes, ‘It’s OK. You’ll learn,’ and only later did he realise that it wasn’t reassurance or prediction, but judgement.

By the end of the first day he was too dazed to do more than follow his gang back to their camp, sitting silent as they ate. Thirty men together made a clamour of talk, joking, quarrelling, boasting, and he sank into the background, spinning his knife round his fingers. Then suddenly everyone’s attention was on him; Li Ho was challenging him, ‘You, new boy, you can’t work worth a damn. What can you do?’ 

A rat rustled at the edge of the firelight; the knife flipped out and the rat squealed. ‘That. I can do that.’ 

It raised a laugh, and Li said, ‘Maybe you’ll do.’ He had the beginnings of a place.

In the morning his muscles raged, and he took minutes to straighten up from his cot and walk. Yiu saw him and laughed, but there was sympathy in it: ‘I was as weak as you once.’ He couldn’t believe that: Yiu, he already knew, was a strongman, he could lift the load of two men, he never tired. ‘Come with me,’ he said, and the young man had a protector, someone to pace him, to take up the slack, to share his tea. Why did Yiu choose him? He never knew, but like a drowning man, he reached for the hand he was offered. 

By the end he had nothing to give. He remembers the last evening, the boy lying fevered and thrashing in the tent, how he cooled him with water and spoke hollow words of comfort, knowing that he was going to die alone. ‘He was never going to last,’ said Li Chin, but he could have done. _He could have been like me._

He remembers the inevitability of discovery, not far enough away, not fast enough, nowhere to go but back along the tracks, nowhere to hide but among his own. The pretence that he could just walk away and hide in the crowded alleyways, that it could be so simple. But within the day there was the clink of coin, voices, Cheng who knew just where to find him. ‘We can make this easy,’ Cheng told him, and it was, the slash of a knife, Cheng’s hands on his, eyes rolling back into his head. He was shocked by it, the first time, watching the blood drain away onto the earth floor, standing trembling and awed, but it was their bargain all along: life has its price.

He remembers the grave so close by the tracks. How could he sleep, hearing the trains go by? How can he rest? The whistle of steam echoing over the desert still makes him shiver, seeing in his imagination the sleeper shift and turn.

\---

The railhead is always in motion, always moving forward, leaving its trail of iron behind it, and the camp moves with it, tents and shanties shifting, sheds put up and torn down, today’s trackside depots and offices tomorrow’s empty shells. The camp is always the same and yet it's never really there. 

The workgang becomes his family. It’s seductive: the satisfaction of a day’s labour, the firelit evenings, the closeness of sleep. They smoke together, they ease each others’ days and nights, and belonging creeps up on him. He sees them again, Yiu his ally, his protector, his friend; Leung and Tam, tight as brothers, trading insults all day and all night, suspicious Li Ho, Li Chin rattling the buttons at fan-tan. Men together pretending that it was enough, backs turned to the dark, quarrelling, storytelling, gambling, smoking, familiarity become affection, shared hardship become brotherhood. 

In the eternal now of the construction, the future is all they talk about: the life which will start, _after_. They all have dreams, large or small, the laundry, the boarding house, the opium empire, the city emporium; independence, prosperity, status. They sit and spin their futures in the smoke. Two years, three, five, the railroad will tick them away for you, shift by shift, load by load, shovel by shovel, and at the end is the prize. 

The work itself is seductive: the pride of measuring up, the sense of status and worth, the rightness as you form part of the working whole. There’s meaning in it, laid and tied, stretching away until the rails meet; Kwan, he finds, has given his life to it: out of indenture, he’s chosen to remain, the railroad his world. He could do the same: he pictures himself inching ever further east, further north, and it whispers to him with borrowed pride in being part of the great machine.

\--

The landscape is unforgiving, but then why shouldn’t it be? They’re shearing through it with steel and iron, tearing it open and stitching it up again with rails, and the land fights back at them every step of the way with heat and windscour, avalanche and fever. Towns and campsites, spoil heaps and quarries aren’t the only things they leave behind them: graves line the trackside too.

He remembers particular moments of jolting realisation, scales falling from his eyes, but time makes him wonder whether it was really so, or whether he’d seen, known from the very first day in San Francisco. He asks Yiu, ‘You’re strong, you could handle a rail like nothing: why don’t you get to be an ironman?’ 

Yiu says, ‘We’re coolies, that’s what we are.’ His gaze is keen, piercing, and the world shifts a little under his feet. The whites are the aristocracy of the railroad, the ironmen, tie-men and spikers; the Chinese are labourers. The hostility surprises him: there’s no brotherhood of iron here. 

Other things, small things: the foreman’s amused disgust at their meals ( _twigs and ears, heathen food_ ); the gabbled mockery of his language; a blowing page of newsprint with a picture, a comedy Chinaman, grotesque and exaggerated. It turns him inside-out; he stands looking at himself, painfully aware of how he dresses, how he speaks, how he moves. It sits in his gut like a stone. He’s come here to build the railroad with sweat and muscle and time, and he’s being paid in shame.

In the fever of newness and the struggling to learn, he’d never thought to ask, why was he there? His new family had tested him, accepted him, welcomed him, and he never considered who he replaced or why, the gap in the machine into which he was being fitted. Later Cheng came back, list still in hand, and took six of them away, Leung included, their cots empty in the morning, belongings gone. ‘They weren’t out of time,’ he said, but Cheng laughed at his confusion. ‘They’re recruiting further east, want useful workers, seasoned men. Not you. Contract’s worth more there.’

Life is cheap on the railroad, and eventually he comes to understand that he’s not a man at all, but a piece of equipment, a mule or a pickaxe or a wooden prop, to be used where needed. New men come to take the place of the old: they survive or they don’t. Constant motion, always forward, stability a comforting illusion.

The future is all they talk about, but he begins to hear what’s not said, the futures they’re not being offered. They can work in the fields, but they’ll never be farmers, never own their own land. They can own a shop, but they’ll never be citizens, never hold office. They can labour and serve, but what they’ll get is a lifetime at someone else’s command. The weight inside him moves with the possibility of life. It speaks for the first time, and what it says is _no._

\---

The railhead meets the mountains and its motion slows. These ridges are still living, bone-hard, and tunnelling through them is near impossible. The ticking machine winds down, each day progress so small as to be imperceptible, the ironmen forced to halt behind them. They cut with pickaxes, they blast with powder in the cracks and seams, and the company buys its tunnel with lives.

He’s on a gang working from inside the mountain, a nightmarish cramped space, suffocating dark, choking dust, hacking inch by painful inch, the bones of the mountain no more than chipped at the end of a shift; his arms tremble at night from the effort. Each shift he hears the stone creak and settle around him, and he feels the cheapness of his life as never before. But when the end of the world comes, when creak becomes shudder becomes slide becomes crashing rockfall, he’s not even there. He’s standing, beaker of tea in hand, in the light. 

Through the billowing dust he sees men running into the haze of dust to help, to clear, to dig, and he runs too, into the crush, pulling pointlessly at stone with his bare hands, sure that there must be a chance to save, to rescue, until he realises the scale of the collapse, the whole roof of the tunnel down in one mass: not even a strongman could survive that. It wasn’t him who found Yiu, who freed him, but he saw him carried out, saw the injuries and the open eyes, and stood there, bereft. 

He’s a tiny cog in a huge unstoppable machine, and cogs suffer no disasters; pickaxes and rail ties don’t mourn. The work doesn’t pause and the railhead moves on, leaving Yiu at the trackside, his marker receding into the distance. The boy who takes Yiu’s place is younger and even rawer than he once was himself and he wants, he really wants, to rebuild, to offer the same lifeline to the new boy, but he can’t. He’s too full of rage at what he’s lost, at the broken family, the years of his life, the dreams turned small and petty. He feels the shifting foundation on which he stands, sees the unreal nature of the comfort he once found, and he turns his back as the boy staggers, dazed, through the labour and sits exhausted and alone. ‘He won’t last,’ said Li Ho dismissively, and his own actions make that too a judgement.

He sees the possible futures before him, and he rejects them all. The future of Chinatown, market stall or opium empire, shop worker or city boss, forever bottom of the heap no matter how far he rises. The future where the railroad becomes all he knows, following the rails into the distance. The future of service, gardener, houseboy, laundryman. The future of no future, where he dies in a crush or a landslip or an accident and lies like Yiu in a shallow grave at the trackside. _No. No, no, and no_. He wants a future where he’s part of this new-made world, where he’s a man, not a Chinaman. So he lets the thing inside him hatch out and calls into being a different future, one that he’ll scour out of the land for himself. 

Once he’s made his decision, murder is the door he walks through. He might as well have cut their throats then and there. 

\---

On the other side of the door death follows him, stalks him, and he gets in close, wrestles it into submission. First the railroad company’s own men, expecting an easy catch ( _only a Celestial, where does he have to go?_ ). Then the first bounty hunter catches him out in the wild. He’s the first of many to underestimate his target, and when the man is on the ground gurgling blood, he has a horse and a rifle and a warrant telling him to change his name. He can’t shoot a rifle and he can’t ride a horse, but he can trade one and learn the other. 

Death becomes his trade: he’s over the threshold of right and wrong. He can earn more money by cutting a man’s throat than he’s ever been paid. He sees himself, like Kwan, as a tiny moving part of a much bigger machine: now he’s the blade in someone else’s hand, for revenge, for rivalry, for business turned sour. It’s not an easy life, and it’s a lonely one. Sometimes he wonders if it’s the taint of blood that drives away affection. He tells himself that he’s too rootless to make friends, but the truth is that he left hope and trust behind when he abandoned his threadbare family and his second-class dreams, and inside that the real truth is that is that he’s forgotten why it matters.

What he has is himself, a new-made being for this new land. He takes a name and makes it his own. Piece by piece, Billy Rocks comes into being. His hair grows long and he could have it barbered in any town, but instead he knots it and pins it under his hat. He turns his money into shining tooled knives, then into fancy sheaths for them. He finds the gloves and makes them his own. He’s exotic and he’s flashy and for good or ill, he won’t be ignored. 

He’s not an equal. He’ll never be that; he’ll always be an Asian, a Celestial, a foreigner. He’ll never walk into a store or square up to a fight without being an outsider. But what he has is worth having. He’s not a nameless labourer dragging a chain of debt – he’s Billy Rocks. He’s fast, tough and ruthless, and he’s better than you are. He has no family. He has no friends. He imagines himself into existence, becomes his own religion, single-mindedly carving out a place in the world.

He’s sinking southwards, moving across this improbable continent, putting as much distance as he can between him and his broken contract. It doesn’t entirely deter the bounty-hunters, but it makes them work for the money they won’t earn. Through the mountains, down to the cattle lands and the farms, right down to the cactus and the desert. He forges his own path, drifting, fighting, hybrid, anomalous.

They still come after him, infrequently, in ones or twos, and they still take him as an easy target. On this point he allows himself to take pleasure in killing: bounty hunting, it seems to him, is a low activity. Until one day in a bar in Texas, he meets the last bounty hunter, a man who can’t fight and who sees him as he wants to be seen; a man who wants, impossibly, to be his friend, who opens him up like an oyster and guts him like a fish.

_I won’t be your servant, Goody. I won’t be your slave. I can’t._

-

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This has been getting out of hand, so I'd better post it while it's still marginally coherent. I've tried to make it as true to the historical reality as I can manage; apologies if any of it is inappropriate to those closer to the history than me, and if my research on names has let me down.
> 
> Historically-minded readers will spot that not-yet-Billy is working for the Central Pacific at this point (they're blasting in the Sierras), not the Northern Pacific; this is because the indenture has to be what pays his passage to America, and if he's recruited straight to the Northern Pacific he can't arrive before 1871/2, which compresses the timeline too much. So I've assumed that he came over in the mid-1860s when Central Pacific were bringing in large numbers of Chinese workers, and that his indenture was sold on to the Northern Pacific after a few years, as they started recruiting workers before they began serious construction. 
> 
> The description of the rail camp owes a great deal to China Mieville's _Iron Council_.


	3. Chapter 3

Goodnight’s dreams aren’t usually like this. There’s a mountain lion on his back, breathing hot and rank on his neck, pulling back his head to tear at him, and its touch fills him with desire. He’s burning up, pulse hammering in his throat, pulse in his groin. The lion is running its claws down his chest, desire coming off it like smoke. He can feel its teeth poised to close in his flesh, and between dream and reality he struggles to find his will: does he want to fight free or to surrender to its embrace? There’s a hand on his face in the dark, a voice close to his ear: Billy is pressed up behind him, nails scoring down his chest, laying him naked, choking out words of want and possession, and Goodnight leans back into him, all breath and heat and hardness. He’s biting into his shoulder, grinding against him in a fever of need, and Goodnight turns and gives himself up to the golden velvet and the claws, lets Billy takes him as his prey, desperation washing hot off him; it’s too fast, too raw, passion near to violence, and behind his eyelids Goodnight sees the lion as it traps him with its weight, lets it rake him open until they’re both straining for breath in the stifling dark. 

He wakes with the light of dawn, Billy for once still asleep beside him, worn out by the storm. Storm it was: he’s happy to give Billy whatever comfort he feels able to take, but it’s another sign of how his bad night has knocked their relationship off its axis, set Billy spiralling between inturned shame and physical rage. He’s not sure that he understood the whole of the story which came spilling out last night, but he understands the weight of what was said. He’s distant from his own roots, the war a chasm grown too deep to cross, but he’s not cut himself free of it like Billy, made himself into something else. He still loves the steaming green bayous, the grand houses, the French which steals onto his tongue between thought and word, and although he could never go back there and be the man he was, he carries it with him. But now he sees how far Billy has come, how great his courage and how tender his pride; he wants nothing more than to take the young man who became Billy into his arms and apologise on behalf of his nation, but he knows better than anyone that sorrow and regret change nothing. 

\---  
The red marks on Goody’s neck, glimpsed before he hastily ties his cravat, are the most painful evidence of what’s wrong between them, and all Billy can do is turn away. His nerves are constantly scraped by the loss of their easy companionship: moments of awkwardness which weren’t there before, a new consciousness of the who-does-what of mundane tasks. It’s like a piece of grit in the boot, a burr under the saddle, a sharp corner to snag and fray the threads that link them, one by one.

After so many years of silence he was surprised when he just couldn’t stop talking, the flood of memory scouring out, and it’s left him off-beam, living the grief and shame all over again. He knows it came out all incoherent, and in the evenings he lets Goody draw more out of him in fits and starts, sitting behind him with Billy leaning up against his chest so he doesn’t have to see his face, stroking gently down his arms to calm him. It helps to explain him to himself, but naming a problem doesn’t make you any better able to control it: he wants to help Goody, but sometimes his nightmares get the upper hand; he wants to get beyond his injured pride, but he can’t. Out here in the emptiness of the prairie it’s better – not cured but better – but unless they’re going to turn their backs on humanity and become half-wild things, it’s no answer.

For the first time they’re genuinely drifting, drawing out their time the trail, unwilling to name a plan for the future, but necessity comes nipping at their heels: their provisions are running low, and by the time that Billy takes the last cigarette from his case, the decision’s made for them.

‘Helena, I reckon,’ says Goody as they make their way over the hills, ‘it’s a fair-sized place and there should be some card games to be had.’

‘Are we card players now? I thought our trade was fighting.’

There’s an unusual nervousness in Goody’s fingers, picking at a loose thread in his waistcoat. ‘Seems to me the card table might be a better occupation right now: save you standing up for a quick-draw while you’re…’

Billy draws up his horse. ‘While I’m what?’ _All sharp corners_.

‘Unsettled. Off your game.’

‘I am never “off my game”. And even if I were, the hicks we go up against still wouldn’t stand a chance. I could go in there half-dead and still kick their asses ten times out of ten.’

Goody turns in the saddle to face him. ‘Billy, I am not going to stand and watch you get shot because I’m so goddamn difficult to live with.’

Billy can see that the fear is genuine, but he can’t let up. ‘We need money. You’re no card sharp. Let me decide.’

‘Please,’ asks Goody, ‘Can we at least try it my way first?’

They stop to water the horses at a creek before dropping down to the town. Billy stands on the bank, watching the water braid and flow, and Goody comes to join him, slowly as though he might start and run. When Billy doesn’t speak or shrug away, Goody wraps his arms around him to hold him close, kissing the side of his head and burying his nose to inhale the scent of his hair. ‘Last chance to do this for a while.’

Some of the tension bleeds out of Billy, and he leans into him, feeling the scratch of beard on his face and the solid warmth pulling him back to himself. Goody’s always been the more demonstrative, words of endearment coming more readily to his lips, and Billy’s grateful that he refuses to let him close himself off.

‘You know how much you mean to me,’ says Goody, low. ‘Just remember I’m on your side.’

‘I know,’ says Billy, and the rest of what he wants to say catches in his throat, so he rests his head on Goody’s shoulder instead.

‘And _chéri_ , no more picking fights with bigots: it isn’t fair to them.’

Billy smiles, cat-like. ‘But I can fight them if they start it?’

‘Only if they start it.’

\---  
_Can we try it my way_ , he’d asked, but Goodnight already knows it isn’t going to work. Billy’s gone to chase up a connection in Chinatown and he’s sounding out a likely card games in Helena’s fancier hotel, but it’s a bad bargain whichever way you look at it. He’s not a professional card player, schooling his own face and body, alert to other men’s tells; to gain an advantage he has to call on other methods. Most men are only too happy to make a place for the legendary Goodnight Robicheaux and to get caught up in tall tales and Cajun charm, but there’s a price to be paid for that, in guilt and darkness. 

It also puts him in the kind of place where Billy’s not welcome, and when he appears at the door of the hotel Goodnight immediately he feels the subtle shift in atmosphere. Rather than endure another confrontation, he rises from the table where he’s sitting with a group of mine surveyors. ‘If you’ll excuse me, gentlemen, I see that my partner has arrived.’

‘Your partner?’ The question is pointed.

‘Yes,’ says Goodnight firmly, ‘my partner Mr Billy Rocks. Thank you most kindly for your company, gentlemen, but we have business to discuss, so I’ll take my leave.’ 

Together they walk back along the boardwalk to find a seat outside the telegraph office. Despite Goodnight’s claim, they sit in silence for some time, the life of the town ebbing and flowing before them.

‘I spoke to some people,’ says Billy eventually, ‘and there might be a job here.’

Goodnight looks at him, but Billy’s gazing away across the street. ‘A job,’ he prompts.

‘Yes,’ says Billy. Goodnight waits it out. ‘For Hung, Ah Hung, the boss here.’

‘Someone you know?’

‘From a while ago.’

‘A job involving your specialised skills?’ asks Goodnight.

Billy narrows his eyes. ‘Maybe. I could go and talk about it.’

‘Well, I hope you make a better fist of it with them than you are with me,’ says Goodnight mildly.

Billy turns to face him. ‘It needn’t involve you.’

Goodnight takes the time to study him, his dark eyes, the smooth planes of his face, fine-fingered hands turning over a book of matches. ‘Everything you do involves me.’

In the late afternoon, while Billy’s away again to discuss his proposition, Goodnight settles again on the bench out front of the telegraph office to wait for him. He sees now what Billy was looking at this morning: almost opposite is one of the narrow alleys which forms part of Chinatown. From here he can see close-packed stalls outside small board-built shops, lines with washing, flapping flags and hurrying men, some in coats and pants like his own, some in quilted jackets and slippers.

Billy’s disappeared into there, and Goodnight gives it his consideration: a town within a town, three close-packed blocks which are pretty much a mystery to him. Oh, he’s walked down the cramped streets to take his washing to the laundry or to buy meat, but like most, he’s only ever skated over the surface. He doesn’t begin to speak the language – he doubts that the few words he’s learned from Billy would convey the right impression if spoken to anyone else – and he’s always, well, seen it as a place apart. Since taking up their partnership they’ve confined their activities to parting farmers, miners and barflies from their dollars, navigating an entirely white world, and it’s never really occurred to him that Chinatown might be as much home to Billy as the saloon and the alley fights. 

\---  
Billy sinks into Chinatown like a stone falling into water. It’s not like walking back into his childhood: this is a hybrid thing like him, the shops and houses American-style of boards and tarpaper, men wearing eastern or western clothes, or both together, stalls selling squashes and elk meat alongside dried abalone and gunpowder tea. But there’s the warm bath of his own language, the flags and lanterns, the scent of incense and glint of brass from inside the joss-house. He feels the invisible web of connections: these are three cramped blocks, Hung’s tiny empire, but they’re part of a web which stretches not just to the ports of the west, San Francisco, Los Angeles, but right across the ocean, bringing silk, opium, porcelain and people, sending letters, money and human bones. He sees himself as he walks the alleyways, knives on display, heads turning to watch him, and he feels the pull of a thread that he thought was cut long ago. _I left this behind. I chose what I have_. And a voice in his head says, _Choices can be made again _.__

Making his deal takes longer than he expected, and when he returns he’s not surprised to find Goody gone from his seat on the boardwalk. Enquiry leads him first to the livery, where Goody checked on their horses but clearly didn’t linger, then to the edge of town. Billy tracks him down sitting under a tree with a book of poetry in his hand, and stretches out beside him on the dusty grass. It’s plain that he isn’t going to be led down the questioning route again; he just grazes a hand down Billy’s calf and goes on reading. Billy tips his hat over his face to keep the sun off, and after a little while offers, ‘There are pros and cons to it.’

Goody closes his book. ‘Pros first.’

‘Hung’s offering serious money. He’s the top man, the boss: been here since the town was settled. Now someone’s trying to come in from outside, and he’s looking for support. It sounds a pretty easy job, a lot of face and threatening and a little bloodletting. Same as we do already.’

‘Have to be some serious cons, then.’

‘It’ll take time, a couple of weeks, and I’d have to be on the inside, part of Hung’s operation here. It’s not a job I can do living in the boarding-house. You’d stay here, and I’d be - ’

‘No.’ Goody’s response is instant. ‘Absolutely not.’

‘I thought I wasn’t your servant,’ says Billy quietly.

Goody smiles at him. ‘I don’t mean that you don’t get to decide, I mean that if you want to take it, I come with you. I doubt I’ll be much use to you, but where you go, I go.’

Billy sits up on one elbow. ‘It’s Chinatown. You’ll stick out like a sore thumb, you won’t understand what anyone says, and you’ll be alone most of the time anyway.’

‘Most of the time, not all of the time,’ says Goody, settling a hand on his shin again. ‘And if you have to explain, you can say that I’m your manservant.’ That surprises Billy into his first genuine laugh in a week. ‘You can tell me as much or as little about what you’re doing as you see fit; if I can help, I will, and if not, well, maybe I can learn something.’

‘Goody…’ says Billy, and falls silent.

‘The job’s your decision,’ says Goody, ‘and that’s mine. Now shall we see if there’s a place where we can eat without having to suffer the appalling company from this morning?’

\---  
Goodnight packs up his bags without trepidation. Billy, he reckons, is unduly concerned: he’s prepared to bet that most of the men in Chinatown understand a good amount of English, and custom can be learnt. The desire to keep hold of your own language and culture is, after all, something he knows well, and a gentleman is at home in all company. If he’ll be trailing in Billy’s wake, that’s no more than he always does, though Billy doesn’t ever seem to see it. He teases him that he’s a mysterious man of the Orient, and perhaps it would be better if it were something less of a mystery.

‘Hung owns most of the land here, oversees the trade, makes sure things run smoothly. I came across him before, did one or two jobs for him.’ As Billy’s talking he’s leading Goodnight down one street, then another, past vegetable and tea stalls, hardware and apothecary shops, gambling parlours and wooden storehouses, packed in tight. The alley is so narrow that every inch is crammed with people, stalls, goods. ‘This man Lee, he’s been trying to weaken his hold, targeting his couriers, sending in his own men.’

‘Will it come to an all-out fight?’

‘That’s not what Hung wants. Chinatown’s small: so many people, all packed in close – it gets intense. Everyone sees who does what, so a lot of it’s about face. I need to show that I’m his hire.’

They stop outside a shop where bolts of cloth are stacked up and draped from the rafters. ‘Here’s where we stay, says Billy, and turns to press his bag into Goody’s hands. ‘Hold this,’ he says, deadpan. ‘And let me do the talking.’ He leads the way into the shop.

The shop is small inside, made smaller by the swathes of cloth hanging from the ceiling and the bales stacked all around, cloth of all kinds, from rough canvas to the finest embroidered silk. They’re welcomed by an elderly man, hunched from tailoring, who Billy introduces as Liu; there are three generations of the family, Liu himself, his son in his twenties, and a boy no more than eight. 

Goodnight bows: ‘Goodnight Robicheaux, of Baton Rouge, Louisiana, honoured to make your acquaintances. And yours too, young man. I trust our association will be a long and happy one.’ 

Billy throws him a look of pure exasperation, but as Liu sounds out the syllables of his name Goodnight realises with a start that here, he no longer carries his reputation like a weight around his neck. No one here cares about the war, grey or blue; no one’s heard of him, the killing and the dead part of a different world. It’s as dislocating to him as the language and the surroundings; it’s unfamiliar territory.

\---  
They’re sitting drinking tea, the boy staring in fascination at the pair of them, when Hung arrives, barking instructions at his followers. It’s a long time since Billy last saw him, and the man who enters is fat, greying, hair in a queue, extravagant jacket in black and purple silk. His face is hard, and he’s obviously used to being obeyed: Liu rushes to offer him a seat and serve him tea. He takes his place at the head of the table, fixing Billy with a stare. ‘You brought a _gweilo_ with you?’

‘My partner,’ says Billy, ‘Mr Goodnight Robicheaux.’

‘Ah Hung.’ Goody bows; Hung ignores him. ‘We don’t need _gweilo_ getting involved in our affairs.’

‘Goodnight’s here with me. He’ll stay out of your way if you want.’

Hung snorts. ‘Does he walk three paces behind you? Can he make himself useful?’

Billy is glad Goody can’t understand. ‘He’s the best shot with a rifle there is.’

Hung turns to Goody and says in English, ‘You are sharp-shooter, eh? You come to work for me?’

Goody says with dignity, ‘I’m Billy’s partner: whatever agreement he reaches with you, we’ll abide by.’

Hung turns back to Billy. ‘Yu Ho told you about my couriers? We’ve lost three in the last month. And people here are being bought.’ His gaze rests uncomfortably on Liu.

‘Lee must have some reliable contacts here then,’ says Billy.

‘Yes, but that’s no longer the only problem. Word came today from Butte that Lee is on his way here himself: he’s on the stage. Be here in a few days. And he has two men with him, both expert.’

‘That changes things.’

‘It changes nothing!’ Hung thumps the table. ‘This is my town!

‘I’ll need to speak to Yu Ho.’

‘Tomorrow,’ says Hung, standing up. As he leaves, he orders Liu, ‘Make sure they have what they need.’

Billy’s been absorbed, the language smooth on his tongue, the work beginning to quicken and burn in his veins. He’s already forgotten Goody, left him sitting wordless and alone, just as he warned him. But when he turns from the table, there he is in the corner with Liu’s grandson, heads together over a board. Goody moves a piece and the boy shakes his head, shows him a better move. _Like a singing bird_ , thinks Billy.

-

They get to sleep in a small room with smooth wood panelling, just two cots and a low table. Goody stretches out in shirt sleeves on one bed; Billy sets the lantern down on its shelf and takes case and matches from his vest before laying it down. ‘I’d invite you to lie down,’ says Goody, ‘but I don’t think the structure will sustain it.’

Billy sits on the floor instead and lights a cigarette. ‘How do you do it?’

‘How do I do what?’

‘Charm everyone.’ He tilts his head back and passes Goody the cigarette.

‘Must be my extraordinary good looks and magnetic personality,’ says Goody, taking the lit smoke from him. ‘Though I grant you that Hung seems to be pretty much proof against me.’

‘He’s a hard man,’ says Billy, ‘and Lee coming, that’s a problem.’

‘Regretting it?’

Billy thinks. ‘No. You?’

‘No,’ says Goody, reaching out to touch his cheek. ‘Any day that I get to lie down with you at the end of it, is a good day.’

‘Not always.’ Billy reaches up to graze his fingers over the skin at his open collar. ‘I’m sorry.’

‘Yes, always,’ says Goody, serious and intent, and Billy draws his head down, his kiss deliberate and gentle, and the smoke slows everything down, intensifies it, until the warm sparking touch of lips and tongues becomes the only thing in the world.

‘You want to move that cot a little closer?’ murmurs Goody after a while.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This has become far longer than I expected, so it's now part 3 of 4. I'm not sure it's very good, but at least they seem to have stopped arguing.


	4. Chapter 4

Goodnight wakes alone, though the lamp’s been left burning low. Because the room is small and windowless it should by rights feel claustrophobic, but in fact he finds it relaxing: the wood panelling makes it like the inside of a cigar-box, muffling the sounds from shop and street, the two of them hidden away like birds in a stone pine nest. Billy’s presumably gone to take up his business with Hung, leaving him to occupy himself. Quite how he’s going to play this one isn’t immediately clear to him, but once he’s dressed he makes a dutiful pass at tidying Billy’s clothes, though he’s so particular with his belongings that there’s little he can do, then goes out to eat a breakfast he can’t identify with Liu and his grandson and indicate his willingness to help out. 

After an hour of moving bales of cloth to and from the store, learning some curt phrases in Cantonese, he catches sight of Billy strolling back down the alley, bareheaded, hair intricately knotted.

‘Nice to see you working,’ says Billy, lips quirking.

‘A life of honest toil: why has it never occurred to me before?’

‘Take a break?’

Goodnight waves at Liu and follows Billy, who ducks under a sign he can’t read into a tiny teahouse. As they enter the proprietor claps his hands and two customers vacate a table for them.

‘I’ve been talking to Yu,’ says Billy, ‘he handles the trade side. Remember Hung mentioned his couriers?’

‘Said he’d been losing them recently?’

‘Yu wants us to go with him end of the week to meet them, see them safe in. Can you see to the horses at the livery, set up what we need?’

‘Sure. How much stuff?’

‘Just overnight. I doubt it’ll amount to much; seeing us going may put Li’s men off. No secrets here.’

Billy sips his tea and Goodnight asks the question that’s been concerning him: ‘You said last night this Li would be a problem. Do you think Hung knew about him coming here before?’

‘Oh yes,’ says Billy, ‘walked right into that one. But it can play out in different ways. And I’m good at what I do.’

‘Oh, I don’t doubt that.’

You doing OK with Liu?’

‘Our acquaintance is progressing in leaps and bounds.’

As he stands up, Billy taps Goodnight’s hip. ‘Gunbelt?’

‘Didn’t think I needed it for toting bales.’

‘Don’t let your guard down, Goody. We’re not harmless.’

\--

Hung, as landowner and boss, has the biggest lot in Chinatown, and a surprising number of businesses crammed into it: a shop with expensive imported goods, porcelain, jade, brass, an opium house and space for gambling, storehouses and at the far end, pigs and chickens in pens. Sitting outside gives Billy the opportunity to make his presence felt, and also to observe not just the surface of street life with its clamour and hurry, but the currents underneath: who deals with who, who visits who, who avoids who. In among this churn and flow of humanity Goody is so conspicuous as he comes and goes that Billy sees him new, fancy clothes, weathered good looks, gold tooth flashing as he laughs. What’s even odder is that he actually seems to be enjoying himself; it’s both slightly impressive and hugely annoying. His strategy appears to be simply to hold forth in his usual fashion to all and sundry, allowing hostility or plain bafflement to roll off him, and apparently it works: he’s currently deep in conversation at the meat trader’s.

After some time Hung arrives, his temper not noticeably improved from the previous evening. He jerks his head and Billy follows him upstairs to the room where he holds court across an expensive table, Yu standing behind him. Mention of Lee soon has Hung fulminating with anger again.

‘He has money, a lot of money, and he’s been pouring it in here. We know who’s taken it; he’s using them to set up new businesses to strangle my trade. It’s a disease, and I want it rooted out.’

‘Tell me about him, the man,’ asks Billy.

Hung considers him. ‘He’s like you.’

That goes in right under his guard. ‘Like me how?’

‘He’s abandoned tradition, cut his hair. Speaks good English, dresses like a _gweilo_ , moves in their world. Wants to do things differently.’ Hung pushes a sheet of paper across the table to him. ‘We fight fire with fire.’

\--

When he makes it back to Liu’s shop at the end of the day, Billy finds Goody sitting by the table, polishing his boots. ‘Where’s Liu?’

‘Out. Didn’t catch where.’

‘Been working you hard?’

‘You should see how he enjoys it,’ says Goody, holding up a boot to assess his handiwork. ‘Want me to clean yours when I’ve finished these?’

Billy sighs; this one is obviously not going to stale any time soon. ‘I can clean my own boots. Come and eat.’

It’s an odd sensation, stepping out with Goody not for pork and beans in a bar but for oysters and rice in a room alive with Cantonese, sparking parts of him gone dormant back to life. When they’re settled, the owner fussing over their choice of dishes, Billy considers Goody in this incongruous setting and asks, ‘Is this really what you want?’

‘Oh, I’m a curiosity, I can see that. But once you get talking, people seem fine. Was speaking to the fellow on the meat stall: might go out hunting with him sometime, see if we can get some deer. And Liu’s warmed up - wanted to know what year I was born.’

Billy gives one of his rare broad grins. ‘Did you tell him?’

‘Didn’t see the harm. Couldn’t follow all of it, but he said I was a horse.’

Billy laughs. ‘That would be right.’

‘One thing, though,’ Goody taps his chopsticks on the edge of his bowl, ‘Tea being well and good, not faulting it, but what do we do for liquor round here?’

An idea occurs to him, bringing another sudden smile. ‘Leave it to me.’ 

  


It’s been years since he played fan-tan but the parlour is just the same, men packed shoulder-to-shoulder around the table shouting their bets, the ring of the brass coins and the tap of the dealer’s stick. The players make space for him and Goody to squeeze in; there’s a confusion of explaining the rules in two languages, cups of rough rice wine. As Goody launches into a tall tale about one time he was gambling in Denver it’s as though ten years ago and today have joined hands, and Billy stands and laughs and calls his bets, drink burning his throat, Goody’s shoulder against his, feeling light, unguarded: carefree.

\--

Passing days see the strange becomes the norm; to Billy’s amazement they seem to have found an accommodation which works. For himself, it’s not just fan-tan and the tastes of childhood that have come to life in him again; he’d forgotten how addictive power could be. What he’s been doing to earn a living are party tricks, quick-draws, street fights, shooting contests, trivial amusements: here he’s the blade in the dark, killing his art and his trade. It’s like a fire you thought gone dead, suddenly swept crackling into life again by a cold strong draught; he walks the streets relaxed and proud. 

He framed it to himself as a relief, to be among people who can speak his language, to bathe in a familiar culture, but that’s not what it is. It’s a drug: one taste has drawn him straight back in. Except … he’s walked this road already, learnt that distance, isolation, is a hazard of the job, but now he has a friend, a second, a lover closer than his own skin to ground him, taking one pace forward for every one he retreats, old and new fusing together into an answer he thought impossible.

\--

It’s an early start when they set out on the run to meet the couriers; Goodnight brings the horses round and he finds Billy waiting with Yu at the end of the alley. Yu is the opposite of Hung: spare, lined, dressed Western-style like them, in jacket and pants which have seen better days. If not for Billy’s evident respect Goodnight would walk past him in the street. _No secrets here_ , Billy had said, and there are turning heads enough as they cross the creek and set out. It’s promising to be hot, the air heavy with dust. Yu and Billy talk a little in Cantonese, then after a while Yu drops back to join him and says in passable English, ‘Not many white men partner up with Chinese.’

_That’s direct_. ‘Can’t say that I saw it in those terms at the time; Billy’s a man of significant talents.’

‘And so are you, from what I hear. Hung’s getting some respect for having you in his pay.’

‘Glad my reputation’s doing someone some good.’ He can see Billy deliberately not listening.

‘How do you find it coming to Chinatown?’

‘It’s plain I have a lot to learn.’

Yu looks sceptical. ‘I’ll be interested to know what it is you learn: usually we’re the ones who change our ways to suit you.’

Goodnight looks him up and down. ‘I can see you’re not a traditionalist.’

Yu returns his scrutiny. ‘I don’t see why there has to be a choice.’ 

  


When they stop at midday to water the horses, Billy comes up behind him to ask in his ear, ‘Significant talents?’

‘Did I specify their exact nature?’

Billy leans in to laugh with him, but behind the joke, he’s serious. ‘Don’t let Yu needle you: he and Hung, they’re worried about outsiders.’

  


Nobody says much more as they ride, and that suits Goodnight. Despite Billy’s words, Yu’s comments have fuelled his thoughts. He’d have to be blind not to see the difference in the way Billy’s treated here, not as outside, with tolerance at best, or simply with deference, but with admiration, even fear - people stepping carefully out of his way, always a clear table wherever he walks in, jumping to his slightest gesture. The contrast with some of the scenes they’ve shared is stark. It raises one immediate question for him: _why does he chase round the ass-end of nowhere with me, scraping a living and putting up with my terrors when he could have better_ , and crowding in behind it another even less welcome: _am I just a hindrance to him?_

By the end of the long hot day they’re still picking their way slowly uphill through sparse trees when the spark of a fire appears ahead. Yu shouts, and as they draw closer they find two men at the fire, horses and mules hobbled at one side. Billy translates for Goodnight, ‘They say no trouble yet, but they’re fairly sure they’re being tracked.’

‘They’d be rash to take on five.’

‘Probably,’ agrees Billy, ‘though they’ve valuable goods: no point being careless.’

They’re a quiet camp, Billy and Yu talking low with the couriers, a stoneware bottle of rice wine passing round. Goodnight’s the first to sit up at night: it’s cooler in the dark, and he lets the fire fade to embers, settled with his rifle across his knees. The moon comes gradually swimming up from behind the trees and the night comes alive with skitters and rustles, the screech of nighthawks and the squeak of rodents. He hears a nervous stamp from the mules, but there’s nothing, just the night and the hunters and their prey.

When the moon’s right up he stands, eases out his muscles and wakes Yu, who settles into his place and lights a pipe. Goodnight lies down on his bedroll next to Billy, who, if he’s feigning sleep, is doing it well; he closes his eyes, and the sounds of the night press in around him. Soft scuffs; a creak of branches, the screech of a bird again. Silence for a while, then a louder squeak: a hunting owl? More scuffs. His eyes open again. _Imagination, surely. On edge_.Yu’s still sitting smoking and gazing into the dark, and Goodnight settles himself again, tries to relax. One of the mules shifts nervously, and there’s a quiet clink, like metal on stone. _No. Yes_. He waits, poised in indecision. Yu’s still sitting there calmly, and part of him knows that it’s just imagination, nerves stretched too thin, and at the same time part of him knows that he needs to react. Another set of scuffs, and Goodnight’s close enough to kick Billy as he reaches for his gun, then they’re both up and moving as the first shots crack out. Too late, Yu shouts and jumps to his feet; dark figures are already on them from among the trees. Goodnight drops one with accuracy; a knife spins over his shoulder and Billy’s gone, silent in the dark. Then there’s confusion, the couriers up and shouting, panicking horses, gunfire all round them; Goodnight spots another and has him in his sights when he sees the face in the moonlight and his finger freezes on the trigger. A shot from Yu goes wide, and sends the man haring away.

‘You could have got him,’ says Yu, coming up behind him, but Goodnight’s not listening. He recognised the face, even in the dark: Liu’s son. 

Billy comes back, wiping off a blade. ‘No point chasing; it’s not like they’ve got anywhere to go.’ Goodnight catches his eye, and Billy shakes his head. 

  


The ride back to Helena is oppressively calm; Goodnight finds no opportunity to talk about what he saw. As they reach the town Yu and the couriers head off with their mules, and Billy goes to join them, handing his reins to Goodnight who grabs his arm. ‘What do we do, just go back there?’

Billy hesitates, then says, ‘Meet me in the teahouse,’ and disappears with Yu. Goodnight takes the horses to the livery then walks back down the main street to the alley where Chinatown starts. He’s never felt the boundary so palpably, standing in the mundane and familiar world and hesitating to take the single step that will plunge him back into a society the foundations of which are suddenly shifting beneath his feet. Intense, Billy had said, and he begins to see how. It’s a while before Billy shows, so he waits, the owner’s solicitousness setting his nerves further on edge. Tea, tea, goddamned tea: he takes a pull from his flask.

When Billy finally comes to sit down, he asks quietly, ‘Too much for you?’

‘Not the killing; killing’s what we do. But I don’t usually sit down and get friendly with the folks I’m going to kill, or their children.’

Billy’s irritated. ‘What you think are the normal rules don’t apply here. See what’s really in front of you, Goody. Why do you think Hung sent us to stay at Liu’s? Do you think he wanted it? He knows what’s at stake, him and his son.’

‘What if he comes back?’

‘My department,’ says Billy. ‘Look, there’s no law here but Hung’s: the sheriff doesn’t bother with Chinatown. What Celestials do among themselves is their own concern, remember? You take your side and you live with it.’

‘Did the boy pick a side?’

Billy scowls. ‘Don’t let your habits of befriending people run away with you.’

‘And another thing,’ Goody lowers his voice further. ‘I doubt you were really asleep last night. Shouldn’t you be worried about Yu?’

‘Goody…’ Billy drums his fingers on his cup. ‘You can leave, you know. Just walk to the end of the alley and step out. If you don’t have the stomach for all of this, wait it out in the boarding-house.’

‘You know I won’t do that.’

‘Then be careful: when Lee arrives the bloodshed will really start.’ 

  


There’s nowhere to go but back to Liu’s, and he and his grandson are there when Goodnight arrives, Liu cutting cloth and the boy sorting spools of thread. There’s nothing different in Liu’s manner, but Goodnight shrugs off his offer of food, gut roiling as he wonders how much was ever genuine and how far he’s been played for a fool. It’s harder to pass by the boy’s enthusiastic greeting, but what is there to say to him: _I almost killed your father last night_? 

He closes the door behind him, Billy’s words echoing in his head. _See what’s really in front of you_ , he’d said, and the image which stays with him is of Yu, calmly smoking his pipe by the cooling fire.

\--

When Lee arrives a few days later, it’s a drama of the first water, played out in public view. The stage passing through Helena is always a big event, crowds gathering as its dust is spotted from far off, and Goodnight joins the press of men at the end of the alley to see it arrive. Further back, Hung is planted in the middle of the thoroughfare, arms folded, scowling at the men waiting to meet the arrivals, Billy and Yu at his side. They’re all concentrating on the figure who climbs down from the outside of the coach, settles his hat and walks purposefully over, the crowd pulling back to create a theatrical arena.

The new man is unusually tall and surprisingly dandyish in western dress, with a long black duster coat over well-cut trousers and fancy tie. Two other men follow him, one a towering giant in a long quilted coat, the other as poised and lithe as Billy, but neither is as charismatic as Lee. 

He strolls up to face Hung, his relaxed urbanity a pointed contrast to Hung’s stony belligerence. Lee’s gaze flicks past him to take in first Yu, then Billy, and as he meets Billy’s eye he nods, oddly intimate; Goodnight sees Billy give the briefest flicker of acknowledgement. Lee then speaks to Hung, all easy good humour. Goodnight can’t hear what’s said, but it obviously brings Hung’s pent-up fury instantly to the boil. 

He turns and snaps an order, and two men emerge from his compound holding an unresisting figure, a man covered in mud and with a bleeding wound to the scalp. They force him to his knees in front of Hung; Lee shows no reaction. _That coat…_ – with a lurch Goodnight recognises Liu’s son. 

Hung gestures, and one of his captors produces a knife. As Hung takes hold of his hair, his victim doesn’t struggle or beg; he faces his death like a dazed steer. Hung shouts a series of imprecations, and draws the blade across his throat with a flourish. Lee simply smiles, makes a dismissive gesture and turns gracefully to stride away, leaving Hung heaving with rage, the fallen body pooling blood into the churned mud of the street. 

 

Lee installs himself at the brothel at the furthest edge of town from Hung, and as he strolls the streets, guards at his back, there’s no one who can’t feel the tension building. After Hung’s grand gesture this is a war fought on the smallest scale, with a word, a clink of coin, a glance held or avoided, but day on day the pressure mounts. 

Too uneasy to while away the time inside the shop, Goodnight has taken to sitting outside on a bale of canvas. It’s a fine position in the oppressive heat, Chinatown laid out before him like a tapestry, the air carrying its distinctive scent of woodsmoke, incense and pigs. He’s not aware of the approaching footsteps until they stop; a tall figure in a black duster coat is looking down at him, considering him like a specimen.

‘You,’ says Lee, ‘Rocks’ _gweilo_ partner.’ His English is impeccable.

'Mr Lee,' says Goodnight, standing. Beyond his fashionable clothes, Lee has a lively and handsome face, the polar opposite to Hung. 

‘Rocks I can see,’ says Lee, without preamble. ‘He has skills and needs to sell them. Why he brings you here, that’s harder to say.’

Goodnight knows there’s no right answer here. ‘Call me unorthodox.’

Lee’s smile would be charming if it were genuine. ‘Tell him he could be working for me. We have a lot in common.’

‘I think that’s something you’d need to tell him yourself.’

‘And you?’ Lee tilts his head back. ‘You see some business opportunity, perhaps? Or have you fallen so far that you think you’ll try your luck here? I don’t think so.’ His eyes are dark and knowing. ‘I think maybe it’s not so difficult to see why you’re here.’

Goodnight, to his horror, feels his face begin to heat. Lee leans in so close that his breath tickles his ear. ‘Come and work for me. If you have a taste for Chinaboys, that can be accommodated.’ His face is full of amusement. Then he tips his hat, a gesture so alien here that Goodnight almost laughs, and walks away.

It’s hardly any time before Goodnight, in the shop again with Liu, hears quick footsteps along the sidewalk, and Billy comes slamming in, flushed and angry. He says something curt in Cantonese, takes Goodnight by the arm and pulls him into their room. As soon as the door is shut he demands, ‘What did he say to you? What did you say to him?’

Goodnight glares at him in silence until he lets go of him. ‘Not the time,’ snaps Billy, ‘this is important.’

‘And we’re there,’ says Goodnight. He eyes Billy coldly. ‘He said you should be working for him. Told him he’d need to speak to you himself.’

‘What else?’ Billy’s flush isn’t just heat: he knows.

'He thinks I'm here because I'm your lover. And he wants to use that to recruit you too.'

‘Shit,’ says Billy. The anger goes out of him all at once and he sits on the edge of the bed. ‘Goody, this is all … going bad. Fighting for power, disloyalty, that’s what you expect. But this thing with Lee…’ Billy’s more openly troubled than Goodnight’s often seen. ‘The thing is, he may be right. Not that Hung isn’t justified in trying to keep what he’s made, but Lee – he’s the future. Hung wants to keep us all the way we were, make a piece of China here; Lee, he’s adapting. Hung said he’s like me, and he’s done what I did – I didn’t cage myself in a little town, pretend that I can’t speak English, stay where it’s easy to be king of a sorry little hill. I want to go where I please, take the whole of this country to be mine: when I die, I’ll be buried here. In the long run Hung’s finished, maybe not this time if it’s down to me, but Lee’s right, you know: I should be on his side.’

‘What will you do?’

‘My job.’

Goodnight sits down next to him. ‘Am I one of your problems here?’

‘No,’ says Billy fiercely, leaning into him, ‘never that.’

  


Still, when Goodnight lies down to sleep, Billy snoring lightly on the other bed, the feeling of safety has deserted him. _I thought this was a place where it couldn’t find me_ , but on the cusp of sleep and wakefulness he sees something dark beginning to seep under the door.

  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Now chapter 4 of 5. I know what I'm doing with this, I swear.
> 
> [1] Goodnight's year of birth is taken from 1ltreede's timeline, at http://1ltreede.tumblr.com/post/151845455508/time-lines-or-i-care-too-much-about-a-fictional
> 
> [2] There is a trivial inaccuracy in this chapter which I ought to have taken out, but couldn't bring myself to. If anyone notices it and wants to call me out on it, please do.


	5. Chapter 5

_Foh juk a!_ It’s the shouts that finally alert them: the pall of woodsmoke is so pervasive in the lowering heat that its buildup passes unnoticed in Hung’s upstairs office. Only when urgent cries of ‘Fire’ break out does Billy leap up, peer out of the window and make for the door, Hung pounding down the stairs in his wake, Yu running up to meet them. Chinatown’s a tinderbox: wooden shops and houses, canvas stalls, packed in without an inch between, signs and hangings making a road for the flames to travel; by the time they reach the street the fire’s taken hold, two shops well aflame and throwing out smouldering sparks to threaten the whole block. The street is like an overturned ants’ nest, men running in all directions, beating at the flames, dashing in and out of shops to rescue goods or racing to bring water from a creek that’s all but dry.

Hung’s presence brings a temporary halt to the pandemonium as he shouts orders, attempting to organise the response, but it’s too little and too late, the supply of water inadequate, the fear of loss too great and soon the swarming panic takes hold again. As order collapses Billy takes a moment to step back, to see, and once he looks, breathing hard from his efforts, he can pick out Lee’s men, still points within the seething crowd. There’s no doubt how this started: it’s a clear challenge to Hung’s authority and his ability to protect his citizens. There’s also no telling how far it will spread, incendiary as the atmosphere is, and he slips away down the alley, round to the back to assess the danger there.

Round the corner there’s less blind panic and more orderly evacuation: Billy sidesteps a man rolling a barrel and backs up to get a better view of the roofs above. Someone crowds into his back and he turns with a curse to find himself confronting Lee himself, wearing his customary smile. It’s reflex to reach for the hilt of a knife, but Lee is never unprotected, his bodyguard all coiled alertness a pace away, alert and tense. From Lee’s manner you’d think they were two old friends meeting at the market.

‘Unfortunate. I hope it won’t prove too damaging for Hung.’

‘You think burning men’s livelihoods will bring them over to your side?’

‘Fire clears the old growth to make space for the new,’ says Lee, unperturbed. ‘You should have changed sides when you had the chance.’

Billy grinds his teeth. ‘I’m a man of my word.’

‘Loyalty’s an admirable quality.’ He leans closer, confidential: ‘ _Goodnight_ not with you?’

Billy’s skin crawls, and what he reads in Lee’s face sets him running, shoving through the crowded streets, cursing Lee, cursing himself, laughter echoing behind him.

There’s no sound from Liu’s shop, and perhaps he’s been stupid, maybe Lee just wanted to see him jump and run. But the door isn’t properly shut, and when he pushes it open he’s witness to a silent, desperate struggle. He sees the broad green back of Lee’s hefty henchman pinning Goody down across the table, arm on his throat; Goody’s still holding his pistol, but it’s an unequal contest and his face is darkening as he twists and kicks in his grasp. Quick as thought, a knife buries itself in the man’s back; he spasms, and Billy tackles him, a second blade to his throat. The man claws at the knife, dark blood spilling down the front of his coat; his breath rattles. It takes both of them to haul his weight off Goody and let him slump to the floor. 

Goody’s shuddering for breath, eyes closed, holding himself up on the table; Billy eases him to sit, runs a hand down his ribs, waits until his breath stops rasping. His own heart is hammering, the only sound in the room Goody’s slowing gasps. ‘Jesus, Goody.’

‘I shot him,’ Goody manages to get out, ‘but it didn’t stop him’. He’s still dazed, eyes unfocused. ‘He just… I wasn’t fast enough.’

Billy takes him by the shoulders, and at his wince realises that some of the blood soaking his sleeve is his own. ‘Let me look.’

‘Flesh wound,’ says Goody, but he lets Billy peel back his vest and shirt to expose a bloody gash.

‘Needs cleaning,’ Goody comments vaguely, but Billy fetches a bandana and ties it up as it is. ‘No. You’ll need to get it seen to by the doc in town.’ He turns Goody’s head to face him, lets his attention focus. ‘Change your shirt, and pack up while you do it. You’re leaving.’

‘You’re sending me away?’ Goody coughs and rubs his throat.

‘Yes, you’re going back to the boarding-house.’

‘Proved my uselessness, have I? Just a liability?’

The familiar war of anger and shame in his face makes Billy’s heart ache, and he grips his shoulder. ‘No.’ He squats in front of him, hands on his knees. ‘He started a fire.’

‘What?’ Goody squints in confusion.

‘Lee. Got his men to set light to Hung’s businesses. Spread like brushfire. That’s where I was, where we all were. Staring in the wrong direction. Goody, he meant me to find you –’ He can’t say it, won’t imagine it.

Goody puts a hand to his cheek. ‘Don’t.’

Billy closes his eyes, steadies himself. ‘Neither of us has been seeing the bigger picture. Lee is winning, making us all dance to his tune.’ He stands up. ‘You’re leaving because it’s time we started playing to our strengths.’

\--

Walking through the crowded alleys, bag in hand, Goodnight can’t but be conspicuous. The fire is out, the damage extensive, and Hung is still in the street, surrounded by a swarm of followers, petitioning, shouting, gesticulating. Goodnight sees him narrow his eyes as he passes, and before he reaches the end of the alley there’s a touch on his elbow and a man saying, ‘Ah Hung. Come now.’ 

He allows himself to be led to Hung’s lot, for once largely deserted, just the pigs snuffling in their enclosure; Hung himself is waiting at the foot of the stairs. His usual bristling intensity is absent; he looks tired, dazed, clothes streaked with ash. Goodnight hefts his bag awkwardly, feeling his injured arm.

‘You are leaving?’

‘It’s not what it seems,’ says Goodnight.

‘You talked to Lee,’ says Hung, eyes searching his face.

‘He talked to me; it’s hardly a secret, out in the street.’

'He offered you money?’

Lying seems pointless. ‘Among other things.’

‘He offers money, women, opium,’ says Hung. ‘You follow Hung or Lee?’

‘Hung,’ says Goodnight. ‘We made a contract, me and Billy, and we honour that.’ 

‘Come,’ says Hung abruptly, and starts up the stairs without looking back. Goodnight follows his boss to the upper storey, wondering quite how this situation came about. 

Inside it’s one long room, surprisingly large, the furniture an odd mix: the floor is rough and splintery and the wall of shelves and drawers ill-made, but the table is expensive and the shelves carry some impressive porcelain; a huge brass table-top with hammered designs leans against one wall. 

Hung goes to the window and jerks his head for Goodnight to join him: it looks down on a confusion of wooden roofs, canvas stalls, tiny walkways, every square inch of space pressed into use; from up here the small expanse into which Helena’s Chinese are packed is plain.

‘This – I build. Many years. I protect. I make deal. I build. Mine.’ And Goodnight gets a brief flash of the vision that Hung sees, his hard-earned empire laid out before him, the land he owns, the people he commands, the businesses he supervises, all tipping in the balance.

He turns to face Goodnight. ‘Lee – it is war. I will not lose.’

Goodnight says, ‘“We fight fire with fire,”’ and Hung frowns for a moment, then barks a laugh. Drained of his habitual aggression he looks older.

‘ _Chungquo_.’ He gestures to the decorations, to his own clothes. ‘Old ways. No more. New clothes. New deals. Change.’

Goodnight nods, hesitates, then holds out his hand. ‘New ways, Mr Hung.’

Hung stares at him and slowly reaches to shake it. He doesn’t smile, but he does say, ‘Deal.’ 

\---

The first thing Goodnight does after re-engaging a room at the boarding house is chase up the doctor and have his injury cleaned properly; Billy’s insistence that he not have it treated in Chinatown was telling.

‘Keep it dry,’ says the doc, tying it off, ‘and change the bandage daily. Anything else I can do for you?’

‘Yes,’ says Goodnight, ‘you can tell me which saloons in Helena do the best trade.’

The doc looks at him quizzically. ‘White’s does the most trade, but I’d say that a man of your appearance would be better off at the Centennial. The games are just as crooked, but the liquor’s a step up from rotgut and you’re less likely to get the clap.’

‘Always useful to have a professional opinion,’ says Goodnight, sliding his fee across the table.

‘In that case, eat before you start drinking.’

  


It’s good advice, and the hotel dining room is suitably crowded for his purposes. He fills a plate and takes it to one of the few unclaimed tables, opening a newspaper in front of him to deter casual overtures. He gives his attention to each group around him in turn, isolating each strand of conversation: the newspaper’s editor is holding forth on local politics, a huddle of men are discussing banks and their risks, and three friends are in a lively dispute over whether a fourth was conned on what he paid for a horse, all set against a background of justified criticism of the food. 

None of this is useful, but he goes on picking at his meal, drawing it out, and eventually catches a fragment of conversation between two new arrivals: ‘…came right in the front door. Well, Claybourne might put up with that, but White was having none of it – had his boys kick him straight back out into the street.’

Goodnight surveys the two as they serve themselves: one is a small man in a fancy coat, the other tall and more soberly dressed, who comments, ‘Say what you like about Hung, he knows his place.’

‘Don’t know why Claybourne allows it: can’t be good for trade.’

Goodnight conjures a mental image of the grubby miners in felt hats and barflies in stained shirts who frequent Helena’s saloons, as compared to Billy, the most beautiful man who ever lived, and feels a visceral rage on his behalf. 

He picks up his plate to signal that he’s leaving, and the two make a beeline to claim the table, still talking. The small man taps his nose. ‘Claybourne has an eye to the future: he’s buying up land.’

Goodnight tips his hat to them and hands his largely untouched plate to the help as he leaves, considering it money well spent.

He takes his anger down the sidewalk to the telegraph office and stops to sit on the bench outside and compose himself. It’s the place where he sat before, gazing at Chinatown when it was mysterious, and he feels an odd dislocation at the contrast between then and now: he walked into there at Billy’s heels, as ill-informed as the rest of Helena’s citizens; he’s walked out as Hung’s sworn lieutenant, witness to his struggle to adapt. The contrast between the rich complexity of the world he’s seen and the contempt delivered outside is like plunging into cold water, the gulf of respect so wide that even a man as urbane and polished as Lee can’t bridge it. He can’t but be affected by it: _I have a lot to learn_ , he’d said, and Yu’s reply rings truer now: _Usually we’re the ones who change our ways to suit you_. 

  


The Centennial Bar seems his obvious next objective. It’s clearly aiming to attract a moneyed clientele: the fancy oak and glass doors open onto a room all mirrors and gaming tables for faro and craps, with dealers in frock coats and fashionably-dressed girls. The employees also appear to be single-minded in their dedication to parting customers from their cash: no sooner has he ordered a drink than a florid man with an amiable manner appears at his elbow. ‘Excuse me, sir, but is this your first visit to our establishment?’

‘It is indeed,’ says Goodnight easily, ‘I’m not long arrived in Helena.’

‘Eli Manning, sir, at your service,’he says, pumping Goodnight’s hand enthusiastically. ‘Can I interest you in a game? Craps, perhaps, or cards if that’s more to your persuasion?’

‘I am certainly amenable to a game of poker,’ says Goodnight, and at the man’s nod a fashionably-dressed girl appears at his other side.

‘Dinah, we’ll introduce Mr…’

‘Robicheaux,’ supplies Goodnight, and a flash of recognition crosses Manning’s face.

‘… to Eddie,’ and he lets himself be drawn across to the card table. 

Manning’s a better player than he tries to seem, and Goodnight doesn’t find it too difficult to lose a few hands; the more money flows, the easier he finds it to direct the conversation. ‘This establishment must be very profitable, certainly if my current experience is any guide: who’s the proprietor?’

‘Silas Claybourne,’ says Manning, ‘over there,’ and he indicates a prosperous-looking bearded man observing the room from beside the cashier’s desk. ‘Of course I’m his right-hand man, you know; worked as his associate in business for many years.’

Sceptical looks among the girls tend to give the lie to this claim, but Goodnight comments, ‘Must have invested a lot of money here: a man with an eye to the future.’

‘We aim to cater to a higher class of customer, like yourself: now Mr Claybourne, he’s a man of vision.’

Goodnight pushes more chips into the centre of the table. ‘I heard that he has dealings with the new San Francisco boss in Chinatown.’

Manning’s face darkens. ‘There are fine profits to be made there in whores and opium, don’t get me wrong, but that new Chink is downright offensive. Thinks he can just walk right in here, looking down his nose at perfectly successful white folks.’

Goodnight works hard to contain his anger, thinks better of folding a promising hand, and says carefully, ‘We all have to adapt to the times.’

It’s not an idea that appeals to Manning. ‘I don’t like it; he can dress up as fancy as he likes, that don’t make him my equal.’

‘No, I can see that,’ observes Goodnight.

‘But Claybourne obviously thinks he’s onto something; that Lee’s been here most days, though if you ask me he should stay in Chinatown.’

Goodnight changes the subject deftly and carries on losing to build up some credit as a worthwhile customer; eventually he shakes his head ruefully over his losses and takes his leave, kissing Dinah’s hand and refusing her offer of more intimate entertainment: ‘I have business to attend to, sweetheart. And besides, I’m afraid my tastes run to dark hair, not fair.’ 

  


At dusk Goodnight threads his way through Chinatown one last time, under lines of laundry limp in the heat, past the teahouses and shops, the lanterns lit outside the joss-house, right out to the edge where the town runs out into woodlots and storehouses. Billy’s dark figure detaches itself from a tree and catches him in a quick fierce hug. He’s found a place behind a deserted sawmill, and sit for a while, unspeaking, side by side.

Eventually Goodnight says, ‘You were right: Lee’s attracting attention. He’s ambitious: he’s been dealing with the saloon owners, undercuttting Hung on the opium, which we knew, but signs are he’s involved in a land deal too. “Making space for the new.” Ask me, Hung’s been seriously outmanoeuvred.’

‘He’s been concentrating on the wrong things. We all have. What else?’

‘He’s insisting on being treated like an equal, walking in through the front door. People don’t like it.’

‘Not like Hung,’ says Billy. ‘So he’ll be alone. Where’s best?’

‘The Centennial. Fancy place. The owner, Claybourne’s backing him for the land deal: I heard Lee’s there most days.’

‘Can you get me in there?’

‘Cher, it’ll be a pleasure,’ says Goodnight.

\--

In the boarding-house Billy hangs his knifebelt on the back of the chair, and shakes his head at Goody’s questioning glance. ‘I have to look as close to respectable as I can. One’s enough.’

‘Don’t you mean two?’ says Goody, raising an eyebrow. ‘I’ll have my gun.’

‘It won’t come to that: just get me served, then when I leave, draw some attention to yourself. Surely that should come easy enough?’

Goody’s not fooled by the joking. ‘What if you don’t get out fast enough?’

Billy laughs sourly. ‘What if? Who’s going to call the sheriff over a dead Celestial? Turf war, they’ll call it: they’ll just send for Hung to take the body for his pigs.’ 

_Quick and clean, and then it’ll be done_. He studies Goody, sitting on the bed in his shirtsleeves checking his gun, injured arm, colouring bruises on his neck. He’s steadier, methodical. ‘I’ll see him dead, Goody. You shouldn’t have been paying the price for this.’

‘Paying the price was what I came to do, remember?’ says Goody.

The argument seems a long time ago. He’s watched Goody labour and learn for him, and underneath his humility he’s glimpsed the iron core of commitment. In reaching for the past he’s found it mutable, flowing and changing under his hands: learning goes both ways. The past may have hammered him into shape, blasted him free from his former life, but now what they have they can forge for themselves.

He tucks one finger into his vest pocket to touch the tiny package of wrapped silk inside. ‘Once this is done, we move on. I can let the past be past.’

Goody doesn’t smile. ‘You should know by now how much choice you get about that. The past will never be done with you.’ 

\--

Time was, he wouldn’t have bothered walking up to the door of this kind of place: Goody’s hand on his shoulder tells him he knows what he’s thinking. The Centennial is doing a lively trade, the gaming tables busy; obviously there’s no one else like him in here. As he follows Goody across the polished floor he casts a professional eye over the room: a long mahogany bar, stairs to the balcony where the girls are coming and going, a cashier’s desk behind the gaming tables, staffed by a skinny intense-looking man, and beyond that a door leading into the back of the building. There’s a gaming table immediately in front of it, and he gives Goody the smallest of nods.

He knows what to expect when Manning appears to greets Goody with enthusiasm: ‘Come to see if Lady Luck favours you more than yesterday?’

‘Yes,’ replies Goody, ‘me and my associate today. We’ll have two whiskies.’

As Manning takes Billy in his bonhomie drains away: Billy remains perfectly expressionless in the face of his scrutiny. ‘Is there a problem?’ asks Goody easily. 

The bartender casts an eye at Manning for permission. ‘No,’ says Manning, joviality returning, ‘no problem: Harry, serve these gentlemen.’

Goody smiles at Dinah and tucks her arm under his, ‘Now, sweetheart, why don’t you introduce me to something new?’ 

Goody’s sudden interest in craps takes them to the furthest table, surrounded by a knot of players; it’s easy for him to fade into the background as Goody feigns ignorance and has to be instructed in the rules. He’s playing his part well, laughing at someone else’s joke, arm round Dinah’s waist, and Billy is too, the oriental servant standing patiently at his back, but the charade stirs nothing in him except a rush of protective love. He wants this to be over.

Manning has behind the cashier’s desk, casting unfavourable looks in their direction, and when he sees Billy watching a comment drifts out, pitched just loud enough to be heard, ‘Seems they can be trained: Claybourne’s got his Celestial showing proper respect, coming round the back today.’ 

It elicits a ripple of laugher from nearby tables; Billy reaches for the bottle and meets Goody’s eye. Goody picks up the dice, offers them to Dinah and declares loudly, ‘Must be my technique that’s to blame – roll for me, sweetheart, see if you can change my luck.’

  


Billy sets down his glass and slips away unnoticed, door cutting off the beginnings of an argument as it closes behind him. The short corridor is empty, closed doors on either side; the murmur of conversation is audible from the left-hand side. He lounges against the wall next to the door, calm settling into him. For once prejudice bends to his favour: step outside Chinatown and we’re all the same. Now he’s Lee’s man, waiting for his boss. At this stage it’s purely a matter of control, a hawk describing lazy circles in the air, waiting until time spirals inwards to the single moment of the kill. He’s so close: one step, one smooth thrust and it’s over, for Hung, for himself. 

The doorknob turns and he tenses, time slowing to a treacly crawl; a man steps through the doorway, and his hand closes on the hilt at his back. Turn, reach, strike: it should follow with the inevitability of water flowing downward, but as he turns and the door clicks shut he’s thrown off balance. This isn’t the tall figure of Lee, but someone shorter, slighter, a weathered face he knows. Face to face with Yu, shock stays his hand a critical fraction: the blade glances rather than strikes, and Yu doubles over, hand to the cut. A moment’s confusion and hesitation is all it takes to condemn him: when Yu stands up again, it’s with a gun in his hand. There’s a grim amusement as well as pain in his expression.

‘I’m impressed,’ he says, ‘actual loyalty.’

‘He bought you,’ says Billy with certainty. ‘Who knows how long ago?’ He knows there’s no help to be had here.

‘I wouldn’t expect an outsider to understand. Drop the knife.’

As Yu picks it up the door opens again and Claybourne stops short on the threshold, surprised at the tableau he sees.

‘A small local difficulty,’ says Yu smoothly.

‘Well get if off my premises,’ snaps Claybourne. ‘Take it back to Chinatown, why don’t you?’

The door slams and Yu motions to the figures approaching from the back door. ‘Move. You’re not the main event, but Lee will want to decide.’ 

\--

Diverting everyone’s notice proved all too easy: one reference to the dealer’s habit of palming a second pair of dice, and Goodnight’s the centre of attention.

‘Trouble, Eli?’ The speaker is a burly man, coat folded back to show his gun, staring Goodnight down.

‘I think Mr Robicheaux will be leaving,’ says Manning, ‘and taking his Celestial _associate_ with him. Isn’t that so?’

Goodnight’s finally free to let his anger out. ‘It’ll be a relief: crooked games I expect, but listening to a jumped-up shitheel like you is more than I can stand.’

‘Get him out of here: looks like the other hightailed it already like the yellowbelly he is.’

‘Tell your boss you helped to screw him over.’ Goodnight lets himself be manhandled to the door and propelled unceremoniously into the street; he keeps his footing rather than rolling headlong in the dust, but nevertheless attracts curious stares. He resettles his coat with dignity and drifts down the sidewalk to lean on a railing at the corner, waiting for Billy’s signal, nerves prickling. Time passes, too much time: surely it’s taking too long? He gazes sightlessly across the street, busy with trade of every trivial kind, bread and beans, soap and snake oil, boys running among the stalls. Each ticking minute agitates him further. Then suddenly he realises what it is he’s looking at; across the street, approaching with an easy stride, tipping his hat to a lady as she passes, is the unmistakable figure of Lee. Goodnight grabs the railing, transfixed. 

_Billy._ He reaches for his pistol, dashes around the building, ignoring the shouts from the kitchen as he wrenches the door open. It’s as though someone else is controlling his movements, forcing him through the actions, unwilling in his own body. In front of him there’s a blank corridor, and the spreading stain from his dream. He takes one step forward, then there’s a crashing blow to the back of his head, and stars are the last thing he sees.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry this has taken so long: the final chapter will be quicker.
> 
> I'm always happy to hear from people on Tumblr: fontainebleau22.


	6. Chapter 6

He’s supposed to be better than this. He’s supposed to be the hunter in the dark, the blade that cuts unseen: he’s not supposed to be paraded through the alleys in broad daylight, the barrel of a gun digging into his back. That Yu can do this shows just how far things have gone: the burnt-out buildings and hostile looks as he passes make it clear that Hung’s day is done, his power unravelled, loyalty long since spent. 

And Billy? He misjudged, misread; and now he has no weapons, no allies, no one to rally to Hung’s cause. It’s as bad as it can be. Goody was at the Centennial: _get me in and your job is done_ , he’d said, but where is he now? Anxiety gnaws at him alongside concern at his own situation. They won’t kill a white man, they wouldn’t dare. Not out in the town.

Yu’s making a show of him, that’s clear. The narrow alleys, usually thronged at this time of day, are largely empty, men looking on silently from doorways or windows, but they take the long way nevertheless so Hung’s failure, and his own, can be noted. Yu’s breath catches from time to time: he tied up the gash Billy made in his side, but it must be hurting him. When they reach Hung’s lot, the businesses shuttered and the yard silent, Billy half expects to see his bulky figure sprawled out on show like a butchered steer, but there’s no sign of him; the few men coming and going are all Lee’s. 

‘Wait,’ says Yu, and leaves Billy standing in the lot, two men with him: they’re guards, but what is he - a recruit? A prisoner? _Lee will want to decide_ , though clearly he wants Billy alive. For the moment. The two men with him stand impassively and the waiting stretches out: there’s nothing to hold his attention but the pigs grunting in their pen. And as he watches, the warning snaps into focus – the shapes in the churned mud where the pigs snuffle and shove at each other: an embroidered coat, stained dark, the outline of a ribcage, snouts rooting happily inside, the fingers of a hand, puffy and pale, sticking from a bloodstained sleeve. Hung has never shown any mercy: why think that there should be any now?

Yu reappears at the top of the stairs and jerks his head, and Billy precedes his captors up the wooden treads, past men he doesn’t recognise carrying brass and porcelain down from the upper storey. It’s bad, but he’s still a piece on the board, still in play, and even a beginner knows that black can turn to white in an eyeblink and reverse the board.

In Hung’s long office Lee is picking cursorily over the remaining objects on the shelves; he turns to cast an eye over Billy with his habitual air of amused superiority. ‘True as steel,’ he observes. ‘Shame it’s not better rewarded.’ 

Billy’s stomach roils with self-reproach, but he clamps down on it, standing expressionless as his knife and hairpins are dropped into Lee’s outstretched hand with a clink, and Yu receives his instructions in a low mutter.

Time ticks past. As Yu leaves Lee takes his place in Hung’s chair, and Billy faces the man he tried to kill. With his dandyish clothes and westernised manner Lee is incongruous against the backdrop of the room; the cheap construction and heavy furniture tell Hung’s story, not his, the decorations speaking attachment to culture and history. Only the traditionally-dressed clerk who sits at the polished table with two strongboxes open in front of him, sifting the documents and cloth bags into piles and making notes in a careful hand, seems truly to belong. 

Lee rolls Billy’s hairpin thoughtfully between his fingers. ‘So this is all it comes down to - a knife in the throat.’ 

Billy shrugs. ‘Was only ever going to end one way, him or you, from the moment you got on the stage.’ 

Lee considers him. ‘You’ve made a lot of mistakes.’ 

He’s smirking, and Billy bares his teeth. ‘Only one I can think of.’ 

‘Two,’ says Lee helpfully. ‘You could have accepted my offer when it was made. Of course you’re out of contract now.’ 

‘Am I?’ Billy’s determined not to react. He’d be surprised if Hung is dead already: he has a good idea of what Lee wants with him. 

Lee gestures towards the window. ‘Take a look and tell me you like what you see. Chinatown.’ He spits the word out. ‘Crammed in like chickens, everything small and mean, and they expect us to be grateful.’ 

‘Going to burn it down?’ asks Billy. 

For once, Lee’s not amused. ‘A few blocks in Helena aren’t important.’ His eyes flicker dismissively over the teacups and brass lanterns. ‘I’m not staying. You could come with me. Be part of it.’ 

Billy casts a look at the clerk, apparently absorbed in his job. ‘If you leave Yu to run the business here, you’re a fool.’ He’s feeling his way across the board, one square at a time. 

Lee smiles humourlessly. ‘Yu’s not ambitious. All you have to do is find out what people really want. Money. Opium. Women, boys.’ There’s a flicker in his gaze but Billy keeps his face still. ‘Mostly money. All loyalty means is that no one’s making a better offer – Hung learnt that too late. And your _gweilo_ friend.’ Lee’s eyes are cold. ‘Cut and run, didn’t he, once he got hurt.’ 

Billy sees Goody in his mind’s eye, smiling in the dust of the morning as he carried bales for Liu, drinking rice wine in the fan-tan parlour, shaking Hung’s hand. What can he say? Of course he hasn’t learnt. He feels the weight in his chest of their bond, heavy and solid. He doesn’t know what’s happened to Goody, but he’ll come to find him. Wise or not, want him to or not, Goody will come; it’s what he’d do himself, the two of them running towards each other into a burning building. He holds Lee’s gaze. He refuses to think of it as a weakness.

Lee smiles again, benignly. ‘But first there’s a job for you to do. Think of it as an audition.’

\--

The first thing he knows is that his head hurts, and the second that he’s lying on the ground. He cracks an eye open and has to fight down nausea as the world spins around him. 

‘What the hell happened to you?’ asks a voice, and Goodnight squints up at a dark figure standing over him. He takes a breath, coughs it out again, and instead of answering flexes his hands and feet, turns his neck, testing. The figure leans down and Goodnight catches the flash of a star. ‘Robicheaux, that right? Strange place to find you laid out.’ 

Goodnight tries to answer, but his attempt to sit up produces a tide of nausea which threatens to overwhelm him. He’s in what seems to be the back of a feedlot, out towards the cemetery. 

‘Buncha Chinamen brought him here, dumped him,’ says another voice, and Goodnight turns his head carefully to see a runty man in overalls peering at him with gleeful curiosity. ‘Thought he was dead.’ 

Irritation momentarily overrides the pain in his head and he manages to sit up. ‘Didn’t you check? What if I’d been bleeding to death?’ 

The man snickers. ‘Ain’t none of my nevermind. Just be thankful you’ve still got your fancy watch.’ 

Now he’s more alert Goodnight sees two deputies ranged behind the sheriff, who takes his arm to help him to his feet. As Goodnight steadies himself against a fencepost he asks, ‘Celestials, eh? How’d you get mixed up with a bunch of heathens?’

Another wave of cold sickness threatens to lay him low again, and this time it’s nothing to do with his head. Billy was at the Centennial waiting for Lee, but Lee was never there. The bloodstain … He looks around, stomach lurching. They wouldn’t kill a white man, not in town, in public. But Billy’s voice echoes: _who’s going to call the sheriff over a dead Celestial?_

He pushes himself upright, reaching reflexively for his pistol, but the holster’s empty. ‘None of that,’ says a deputy, putting a hand on his chest. 

His legs are as weak as water, and he can’t offer any resistance. ‘Billy, my partner: they have him.’ 

‘Your pard – oh, now, wait,’ says one of the deputies, ‘I saw him in the bar, you and that wild-looking fellow had Eli Manning all riled up.’ 

The sheriff eyes him dubiously. ‘Now I could ask you to come down to the lockup and expand on that: it’s no secret there a turf war going on among the Celestials, between Hung and that fancy-dressed new boss, and I don’t like it spreading outside Chinatown, causing trouble for proper businesses.’ 

Goodnight’s in an agony of impatience and weakness. ‘I have to find him. He could be-’ 

The sheriff looks him up and down, disapproving. ‘I know who you are, but how you’re mixed up in it I don’t think I want to know; I’m grateful there’s one thing it’s not my job to interfere with. So I’ll give you my advice: get that lump on your head seen to and steer well clear.’ 

‘I can’t do that,’ says Goodnight. He leans on the rail, willing himself back to strength.

‘If he’s made enemies among his own kind, it’s none of our business,’ says the sheriff. ‘Celestials are a law unto themselves.’ 

The deputy bends to pick up his hat and hands it to him. ‘You’re best advised to leave well alone.’ 

 

Rain is beginning to fall in sparse heavy drops as he starts back to the boarding-house. There’s no knowing how much time he’s already lost. He pushes down the part of him that says it may already be too late – Billy outmanoeuvred, betrayed – he knows with a passionless calm that if he has to face that, then his own end will be quick too. But Lee wanted Billy as his man, wanted to pry the angel of death from Hung’s control as he stripped him of everything else: there may, there must, still be time. 

Up in their room at the boarding-house Goodnight is all cold clarity as he checks what he needs. His rifle, loaded. Billy’s pistol, loaded. Bullets. He has no plan, no idea who he can trust, no one to help and no element of surprise, but his determination is absolute: _War_ , Hung had said, _it is war_ , and Goodnight has found a war again, bloody and ruthless and as corrupting as the old. _So much the worse for Lee. I know how to fight a war_. He’s taken a side and he’ll see this to the end.

As he steps outside the town of Helena is going about its normal business, carts blocking the road and riders shouting, women gossiping and arguing on the sidewalk, boys scuffling in the dirt, all oblivious to the cataclysm approaching in the narrow alleys of Chinatown. So short a time ago he would have been the same, looking without seeing, content to skate over the surface, but he’s learned so much, discovering a world with its own values, violent and bloody, but also rich and intriguing. He’s understood just a little of Billy’s past, of the struggle that is China in America, of the contradiction that is Chinatown. Billy’s partner, Hung’s man: Goodnight crosses the street with swift strides and dives headlong into the cauldron. 

\--

It’s been theatre from the beginning, Lee’s arrival, his confrontation with Hung, the fire; the end isn’t going to be behind closed doors or in the night. When Billy was brought here the lot was almost deserted, but now it’s packed with onlookers: Lee’s men, Hung’s men, men who wanted not to have to choose, all here to see the final act of the drama unfold. It’s still hot, but the rain has begun to fall, each fat drop making a circle in the dust. Billy is ranged with Yu beside his new master on the lowest stair; faces turn to him curiously, but he stares out at the crowd, expression carefully blank. Tiny details snag his attention: the whiteknuckled grip of a hand on a traditional axe, the face of a boy peering from behind his father’s legs, the azure heart of the flower on a silk robe. _What do they think, when they see me?_

There’s a scuffle and a barked shout from the end of the lot. Where they’ve had Hung isn’t clear, but he’s fought: one of his eyes is swollen shut, a bleeding gash runs down his neck and one of his feet is bare. Concentrated hatred still seethes in his eyes, and the sight of his erstwhile lieutenants at Lee’s side makes his face contort with fury. ‘Sons of dogs! Traitors!’ 

Billy sees Yu’s tiny shrug, Lee’s smile and feels a crawl of shame: the three of them ranged together with their Western clothes, Western weapons, Western manners, and Hung the living embodiment of the caricature that never fails to wring his gut: the pigtailed and slippered Chinaman, the irremediable foreigner, everything that he set his face against.

It takes three of Yu’s men to drag Hung into the space that he’s ruled for so long, and they send him sprawling to the dirt, the crowd drawing back with a ripple that’s half contempt and half fear. Hung sits up, alone in the circle that’s opened up around him, embroidered coat darkening in the rain. 

He should seem pathetic, a broken ruler at the end of his reign, but in his stony face and his hands clenching in rage Billy sees him stripped down to his essentials. Take it all away – the power, the respect, the supporters – and see what’s at the core: Hung the trailblazer, the pioneer, clawing his way up in the face of a solid wall of prejudice and ridicule, refusing to accommodate, building his empire brick by brick, foot by foot, bringing _Chunquo_ to America. Hung’s been hammered and tempered, and what’s laid bare is the strength of will that lay behind it, his stubborn determination that what he has, what he is, has always been good enough. 

Lee’s gesture to Billy is small, but it’s enough. He’s already seen the men with axes; Yu and his men have guns, but this is going to be done the traditional way. He walks over, head high. Hung is strong and heavy-built, but he’s older and slow. Billy flexes his hands: he doesn’t need a weapon to kill a man. 

When Billy faces him, tensed, Hung spits at his feet, defiant to the end. ‘Found a new master?’ Billy dives at him. 

Hung’s heavyset, not easy to take off balance, but Billy stamps into his bare foot, twists into his wince and carries him down. He hits the ground with a solid thump, breath punched out of him, but his fingers have closed on Billy’s collar, hauling him off balance. On the ground, churning to mud underneath them, Hung can use his weight, but he’s not quick enough to prevent Billy’s jab to his stomach, and it’s all the opportunity he needs to drag an arm up behind his back. As Hung heaves Billy leans close, the hand in his hair a decoy as he hisses in his ear, ‘Trust me.’ 

Hung stills, panting for breath, and Billy lets up a little, testing. Hung immediately bucks underneath him, and a line of pain rifting across his ribs has him starting back, lifting his hand in shock to see the red bloom on his shirt. Hung lurches to his feet again, stretching out his hands to ward him off and there in one is the glint of a tiny wicked knife. 

It’s all he needs. But how can he persuade Hung to relinquish his last defence, here in the arena, betrayed twice over, staring death in the face? He has to get close: there’s no time for cat and mouse play, and Lee will chafe at hesitation. He snaps a leg in a roundhouse kick under Hung’s guard to set them grappling on the ground again, the crowd inching closer in fascination. ‘I can kill him,’ he tries again, mouth at Hung’s ear as they struggle. ‘Give it to me.’ 

‘Fool,’ snarls Hung, blade slashing close to his face. He’s a cunning fighter, though without the knife it would be going only one way, Billy the stronger and more clinical; but with the blade flickering out almost too small to see, he has to hold back. Black to white, white to black – is there a final play to turn the board?

\--

Goodnight strides through Chinatown, rifle in hand, and the world around him is a flickering lanternshow: a face in a doorway, shouting words he can’t understand; a gout of steam and dried fish from a restaurant; bolts of cloth cascading like blood. No one tries to stop him, and no one comes to help or guide him: he’s a madman, a holy fool, walking untouched through a world that isn’t his. 

The rain falls faster as he passes stalls without customers, teahouses empty to his glance through the door. But at the big corner lot there’s a wall of backs, bright coats and dull jackets, pressing eagerly in. No one’s looking at him, not even Lee, standing conspicuous on the lowest stair; everyone’s attention is focused on the figures struggling in the dirt. _Billy_. The relief starts in his gut and spreads upwards to warm his chest and steady his hand: he’s in time. Billy, streaked with mud, shirt stained red over his ribs, teeth bared in a snarl … and the man he’s forced to the ground, greying hair loose from its queue as he heaves and struggles, is Hung. 

Goodnight’s stomach twists. More traps, more betrayals: _did I ever truly understand?_ Billy and Hung are struggling, rolling together on the ground. It’s not the exhibition he’s used to with Billy’s fights, the dance where he metes out punishment to a conceited challenger; this is brutal, elemental, two men grappling in the mud, panting through gritted teeth, the thud of blows and the slash of a blade. In his confusion he hesitates a second too long, and Yu’s attention is caught, his mouth opening in a shout, hand dipping for his gun. Goodnight’s finger tightens on the trigger, his aim true, and Yu’s cry dies in his throat as he falls. The crack of the shot turns every face towards him. 

Goodnight trains his rifle on Lee. ‘Enough.’ 

He’d have expected to see shock, fear at Yu slumping on the stair beside him, but Lee’s calm. A twitch, and his own small pistol appears in his hand, trained on the two struggling figures. ‘Oh no, Mr Robicheaux. We see this through to the end.’ His gaze flickers to the fight. ‘Don’t you find it entertaining?’

Goodnight grinds his teeth: so many time he's sighted down the barrel and frozen on the trigger; so many times conscience or fear have stepped between him and his target. Now he yearns to pull the trigger, to see this smiling demon jerk and crumple, but he daren’t risk it: Billy and Hung are a rolling twisting tangle, and a shot could kill.

A space has opened up around him, and he knows the knife edge he’s walking; his shoulderblades itch as he senses the axes and long blades behind him. 

‘You’re out of your depth. White men don’t interfere here.’ Lee’s dismissal is, he judges, for show. 

‘I have a contract,’ he says, aim unwavering. 

Lee raises his eyebrows: Billy has Hung face-down, a knee on his back, grinding his face into the mud. ‘Are you sure?’ 

It’s a nightmare come to life, doubt and fear paralysing his hands, tremor creeping into his straining muscles: _I’ll see him dead_ , Billy had said, alight with hatred, and Goodnight’s come here to kill, to rescue, yet nothing’s as he thought: now he finds Lee Billy’s master and Hung is drowning in the mud in the middle of his own lot. Where is the solid ground for him to plant his feet? 

\--

It’s the sudden stillness that draws the eye, the struggle abruptly ended: Billy hauls himself to his feet, head rising to meet Goody’s gaze, his face expressionless as he steps away from the bulky figure, face-down in the pouring rain. A ripple stirs the crowd at the tableau they make: Goody with his rifle trained on Lee’s chest, intent and pained, eyes darting between them; Lee as smoothly complacent as ever, the barrel of his pistol unwavering on Billy; and Billy, sides still heaving with exertion, one hand to his ribs where the stain is spreading. 

‘Call him off,’ Lee orders curtly.

Billy steps towards Goody, tight and controlled. It’s come to this. He’s led them on this path, into Chinatown, into a web of intrigue and danger, and Goody never hesitated: _he followed me with unwavering faith. He worked, he learned, he almost died, and because I needed him he came walking back straight into the heart of the inferno_. 

‘Put your gun down,’ he says. 

Goody’s brow creases and Billy can see what’s at war in him. He can’t ask, can’t explain: there’s only one way to do this, putting all his weight upon the delicate thread of trust between them. Is it strong enough? It is. He’s sure it is. 

He moves closer. ‘Do as I say,’ he tells him, the lone white man before a hundred watching faces. Who is he, a soldier, to take his order? A servant, to be instructed? 

The confusion in Goody’s eyes pierces him to the quick, but he presses, because he must. _Know me_ , he begs silently. _Trust me_. And finally, Goody swallows and his rifle drops.

‘Good-,’ says Lee, lowering his own gun, but the word chokes off in a single moment as the hilt of a knife appears in his neck. His hands go to it wordlessly, his face still in surprise. And in the same moment, with a roar, Hung lurches to his feet, hair wild, clothes and face plastered with mud, yelling in triumph as he signals for the cleaver from the pig enclosure. 

Black, white? With a crash the board is overturned, the pieces scattered: what can it be but pandemonium, men turning on each other, desperate to prove themselves on the only side left, the defeated fighting for their lives, helpless in a rising tide of butchery. A catharsis, for the game played so long and stealthily, the stakes so high, the players stretched to breaking-point; a bloodbath. And at the centre Hung, standing over his fallen challenger, the cleaver rising and falling, merciless. 

_Goody_. Billy is at his side in a moment, amid the rising tide of blood, there to put a gentle arm around his chest, to speak low and quiet in his ear, pulling him through the panic and shout and the tang of iron into the shelter of a doorway where they can stand close at the still centre of the storm. 

Goody looks down, attention focusing on Billy’s shirt. ‘You’re bleeding.’ 

‘Just a scrape.’ The ooze of congealing blood along his ribs doesn’t seem important. Close to, Goody is pale and now the adrenaline has gone he sags a little. ‘What happened to you?’ 

‘Came looking for you at the hotel; I saw Lee on the street and knew it had gone wrong. Someone jumped me: never saw who.’ 

_All my doing_. His wounded pride leading them here, his miscalculations bringing them to the brink of disaster. ‘I let it all go wrong. Lee made a fool of me.’ 

Goody hitches into a grim smile. ‘Didn’t work out so well for him.’

Billy’s too empty for triumph. ‘It was too close.’ As his energy ebbs, what’s left is guilt. He won’t be happy until he’s laid Goody down and checked him over, head to toe. He wants to hold him, to comfort, to apologise; he wishes he could wind time backwards to before they came here, back to that grey dawn, and tell him, _It doesn’t matter. No one matters to me but you_. 

He looks into Goody’s tired face and is humbled at the fierce devotion he’s done so little to deserve. ‘It was you,’ he says. ‘Hung would never have trusted me. But when he saw you …’

‘We should …’ Goody gestures towards where Hung, sleeves red to the elbows, is gradually restoring order from chaos, radiating authority as he shouts instructions and sees the bodies bundled away. 

‘Not you,’ says Billy, taking the rifle from his hands with a brush of their fingers. ‘No more.’ He wants them both free of this, but more than anything else, he wants Goody safe. Now at least he can stand close, a hand on Goody’s chest. ‘Go. Pack up, fetch the horses.’ He smiles, tentative. ‘Please.’ 

Goody stands and watches as he threads his way through the ants’-nest of activity back to Hung. He’s stony-faced under his mask of mud, not a man to laugh or exult: the hand he puts on Billy’s shoulder is all the acknowledgement there’s going to be. But Billy is close enough to see Hung’s gaze flicker behind him to where Goody is still waiting; Hung catches his eye and makes him the very smallest of bows, before Goody strides away down the alley, the crowd parting and reforming around him.

Hung turns back to Billy with a grunt. ‘A lot of damage.’ 

‘Old makes way for new,’ says Billy. He knows he won’t be back here to see it rebuilt. 

‘Hard lesson.’ Hung keeps the hand on his shoulder, leading him back to the stair.

 _Yes_ , thinks Billy, _it was_.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just the epilogue to come.
> 
> Speak to me: fontainebleau22.tumblr.com


	7. Chapter 7

The storm clouds thin and clear as they thread through the scattered sheds and lumber mills at the edge of town; it’s nothing but a relief to leave Helena behind them and let its concerns shrink to insignificance. The town fades to a dark smudge in the valley, then they’re up among the trees, a fresh breeze still blowing as the sun starts to fall to the west. They pick their way to the crest of the hill and Goodnight’s chest expands a little as the country opens up in front of them, the trees thinning where the trail leads away across an expanse of low scrub dotted with rocky bluffs. 

‘Hung tried to pay me half the money, because he killed Lee himself,’ says Billy suddenly; it’s the first time he’s spoken since they collected their belongings from the boarding-house. He’d wiped the worst of the dried mud and blood from his face there and let Goodnight tend his scored ribs, but his shirt and pants are still caked with it.

‘He’s a hard man,’ says Goodnight unsteadily. ‘What did you say?’ 

Billy’s face lightens into the ghost of a smile. ‘Told him he should pay double for you.’ 

Goodnight’s still too shaky to laugh, still reliving the confusion, the desperation, the bloodletting… Billy moves his horse closer until their knees brush; he looks drawn, lines standing out in his face. ‘Get some distance behind us, then we’ll camp.’

They push on, following the road down the hill and into the wild again: their horses are eager after so long in town and the familiar rhythm of hoofbeats and creaking saddles is soothing. Though the sky’s turning red neither of them wants to stop; they branch off onto a side trail that leads due south, skirting the bluffs and crossing the occasion dry wash in a skitter of gravel. Normally Goodnight would be talking, running on with reminiscence or commentary or story, but for now all he wants to do is focus on Billy riding calm and solid beside him, eyes focused off to the horizon, on the stock of his rifle nudging his knee, the freshening breeze on his face and the silence around them. This is where they should be, just the two of them, not in the crowded alleys of Chinatown nor the throng and bustle of the town, but out here with the rocks and the sky.

Eventually when the light really is starting to fade they come across a sheltered spot where a tiny creek trickles down from between a tumble of boulders, and by silent consent they halt. Goodnight’s slow, going through the routine of camp – currying the horses, though they barely need it, while Billy gathers wood for a fire; Billy comes back with a stack of dry branches to find him stopped, gazing off somewhere Billy can’t see, brush forgotten in his hand, and it takes a tap on his shoulder to call him back to the present, an almost guilty look crossing his face.

Once the fire’s burnt up Goodnight heats a kettle of water, sets it carefully beside the bedroll and gestures to the space beside him. Billy could do this himself more efficiently, could rinse his shirt and splash himself clean in the creek, but he knows how much this ritual means. The water is chilly on his skin in the strengthening breeze, but he wouldn’t complain for the world as Goody touches his skin with delicate fingers, washing away the traces of combat and cleaning the nicks and bruises. 

When he’s finally done Billy can see that it’s calmed him, and he smiles as he tugs on a clean shirt and coat: his vest he’ll have to scrub later. ‘Let me see your head,’ he asks. 

‘Not the worst crack I’ve had,’ says Goody dismissively, but Billy’s seen him wince when he moves his head too quickly, and he sits patiently while Billy runs his fingers gently over the lump that’s still there. 

‘Shouldn’t have put you through that.’ 

Goodnight twists round to face him. ‘I seem to remember it was my choice,’ he says, but Billy won’t let him take the blame. ‘I was wrong about it all. Thought I knew, but…’ 

Goodnight’s brow creases. ‘“You can’t step into the same river twice.”’ 

Billy considers. ‘“Only here, only now”, we say.’ He settles with his legs outstretched, back against a boulder, so Goody can lean against his chest; he lights a cigarette, feels the reassuring thud of his heartbeat, and passes it forward, resting his chin on Goody’s shoulder.

Goodnight takes the cigarette. ‘Will Hung last, do you think? He told me, new ways, but there’ll be more like Lee.’ 

Billy takes the cigarette back and draws on it. ‘I’d bet on him. Even in a town like that.’ He blows a stream of smoke upwards. ‘Always us and them, old and new. Why we’re better out here.’ 

‘Anywhere with you, _cher_ ,’ says Goodnight, and Billy kisses the side of his neck. 

A bond like theirs is never going to be easily understood: men will always see Billy as the ill-educated servant or the exploited alley-fighter, or Goodnight as the shaky war hero who Billy parasites on, the desperate man with a secret weakness. It’s a delicate thing to understand even from the inside: a web of trust, built over the years, each individual thread weaving into a connection to stand the most testing circumstances.

 

It’s a good evening, sitting close, talking quietly over the cookfire, a gradual unwinding of tension, though Goodnight can’t bring himself to chatter as he usually does. His head aches dully and though their fire casts a protective circle of light, he can sense the demons waiting out in the dark, just beyond where the light fades. 

And sure enough, though he beds down back to back with Billy under their blankets, they pursue him into dream, an old dream in new clothes, scented with incense and the dusty tickle of cloth, tasting of rice wine and opium, with signs he can’t read and shouts he can’t understand, running with blood – down the stairs, under the door, from the throat in a crimson tide. 

He jerks awake, gasping for breath, legs kicking, to find Billy’s hands on his shoulders and an expression of inexpressible pain on his face. Goodnight lies shocked for a moment, staring into Billy’s eyes, then winds his arms around him, burying his face in his neck. Billy’s hands grip his back as tight as his own, and he speaks aloud the sentence that beats in Goodnight’s throat: I thought I was too late. 

There’ll be no more sleep for either of them, so they build up the fire again and Billy throws a blanket round their shoulders: they sit pressed side by side, staring into the flames. 

‘All I’ve done is give you new horrors to add to the old.’ Self-reproach rings in every word. 

Goodnight leans against him. ‘We ever going to stop apologising to each other?’ The warmth from the fire and from Billy close against his side is gradually driving out the sick cramping cold from his gut. ‘I wanted to come to Chinatown to see what makes you who you are. You took me, terrors and weakness and all; I’d spare you the burden of my past if I could, but if I can’t then I’ll share yours the same.’ He falls silent for a while, then adds, ‘Sam used to say to me, no one comes out unscathed, and we’re luckier than most.’ 

Billy leans closer into him. ‘I knew you’d come.’ 

‘ _Un fil de soie_ ,’ murmurs Goodnight, ‘ _une chaîne de fer_.’ 

Billy laughs softly. ‘You said that before and I never let you explain. Tell me now?’ 

‘Love …’ says Goodnight, but then tails off. Billy waits, one hand comforting on his knee. ‘Tell me about love’. 

Goodnight clears his throat. ‘It’s a poem, about how love can be easy or hard, it can be a thread of silk or an iron chain.’ 

‘Always with the poetry.’ _Is that how it is?_ A thread of silk, too easily snapped, an iron chain to gall and drag? ‘I don’t think it’s either,’ he says slowly. 

The sky is beginning to pale in the east; Billy gets up and stretches, joints cracking, then pulls Goodnight to his feet. ‘Come up and see the sunrise.’ 

The landscape below is still dark and sleeping, the last stars twinkling faint in the midnight-blue above, but on the horizon a golden glow is spreading, touching the clouds above with delicate pinks and purples. They climb the bluff, feet slipping on the loose pebbles, and find a place to sit, faces turned to the brightening horizon. 

Goodnight’s steadier, his dreams beginning to fade and scatter with the dawning light. ‘The past is never past, we both know that,’ he begins slowly, ‘we carry it with us. But things change. That’s what America is, change; it’s new, not a hundred years old, and it’s greedy and restless; it takes the old and mixes it with the new to make something not seen before. And that’s us. When did we ever let people write the rules for us?’

The sun peeps above the hills, spilling shafts of golden light, though the land below is still in shadow; they feel it warm on their hands and faces. Billy reaches into his pocket. ‘Give me your hand.’ 

Goodnight offers his hand; Billy turns it over and presses a tiny wrap of cloth into his palm. Goodnight unrolls it with careful fingers and a small cold weight tumbles out into his hand. He can’t imagine what it can be, but when he picks the object up he sees that it’s a tiny horse, carved from yellow jade. The workmanship is exact in every detail – legs caught mid-gallop, arched neck and flying mane; it has a gold loop on its back so it can hang it from a chain. 

‘Remember what old Liu said?’ Billy touches it as it lies in his hand. ‘I don’t want all your memories of Chinatown to be bad ones. You can put it on your watch-chain.’

‘It’s too delicate,’ protests Goodnight, ‘surely it would break.’ 

Billy closes Goodnight’s hand around it and looks into his eyes. ‘It won’t break. Jade is harder than iron.’ He reaches up to stroke a strand of hair from his brow. ‘You see me true, and that’s all that matters.’ 

They’re never going to fit in with regular society, never going to be respectable or normal, Goodnight too damaged, Billy too alien, they’ll always live on the margins. But there’s a whole world out there where they can be their own strange selves, let themselves make their own unlikely whole. 

Goodnight touches a finger to his chin. ‘You are everything to me. I can’t promise …’

Billy smiles. ‘Who can? But we’ll do it together.’ 

And the sun rises full, spilling over the land, rock and trees, grass and river, lighting it up, flashing gold on the mountaintops, and the road stretches out shining in front of them, theirs to ride together.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And it's done! Thank you to anyone who stayed with me through the writing of this: I've learned a lot from it, and the encouragement I've had has been hugely important.
> 
> Speak to me: fontainebleau22.tumblr.com


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